a little doll

Once upon a time there was a little girl.

She was a nice little girl, with brown eyes, blonde hair, and chubby thighs. Her mother also tells her she had an unusually large head, and that it was difficult to find t-shirts to fit over it.

Of course this lovely little gem was me. Why the sudden self-disclosure? Cassie at A Blessed Life sent out an offer to be interviewed a few weeks back, and since I love talking about myself, I took her up on it. She kindly sent me a list of questions (she's just DYING to know more about me. Who wouldn't be?) so I've finally gotten around to it.

There are five questions vying for my attention, but since I'm nothing if not verbose I decided to simply tackle them one at a time. (Plus, it will give me writing material for such a long time that way!)

So back to Little Cathy: the answer to question number one - What was your childhood like? What were you like as a little girl?

I was actually a holy terror who chased boys around the playground and stuck wads of gum beneath my desk.

Just kidding. I was a nice little girl, like I said above. (The part about my chubby thighs and big head are true, as well.) I grew up in a suburb of Detroit with my only brother, mom, dad, and a parade of small animals like hamsters and chameleons. I was on the smarty-pants side, in more ways than one. I taught myself to read before I entered kindergarten. When I got there, the teacher encouraged me to help the other children who didn't know how to read, tie their shoes, or properly identify Dick and Jane in our readers. I contend to this day that therein lies the root of my servant complex.

I spent the first two years of elementary school teaching the other kids stuff and putting my head on my desk because I talked too much. Somewhere around this time my father began telling me I would argue with the Good Lord rather than accept something I didn't agree with (Smarty-pants, for sure.)

One day in the spring of my first grade year, the principal came into my class and announced I was going to join the second graders. I walked across the hall and bam, I was "double promoted." The older kids accepted me, but my best friend from first grade never talked to me again. (I recently hooked up with her on facebook, so I'm finally hoping to set things right.)

The rest of grade school is kind of a blur. I can't name my teachers or tell you who I sat behind in Social Studies. I can say that I loved school, and that I always got A's. And I can honestly say I didn't feel that was any big achievement. I didn't feel proud or anything - my parents had told me I was an A student, that was how God made me. No special credit on my part.

I never got in much trouble, except for that time in 7th grade when I stole the teacher's gradebook and hid it in Ray Hudson's desk. I was so scared I was going to get paddled, but instead I had to write an essay on the Importance of The Gradebook in The Classroom. Go figure.

My home life focused on trying to get my brother, Chris, to stop pestering me. He was two years older and ten years less mature than I was (in fact, that's still true.) We used to sit in the back seat of my dad's olive green Oldsmobile, which was like a mile wide, and do the "he's touching me" thing. Chris and I had the misfortune of having to share a bedroom, which is probably the most traumatic thing I have ever endured. My mom hated it too, and spent years trying to get my dad to move us to a larger home. Mrs. Morrison, the real estate lady, spent so many years trying to track down a house to please my parents that I thought she was part of the family, and that every kid had a resident Real Estate Lady.

I had a huge collection of Madame Alexander dolls, thanks mostly to my Aunt Anne, who worked in the toy department at Muirhead's, in the basement. (How cool is that?) I had every country in the world (just about), and all of the Little Women, the ballerina and the bride. My brother and I used to have beauty pageants with them. Miss Argentina always won.

For a time my dream was to become a cosmetologist. My mom went to Bingo on Tuesday nights, and I used to do her makeup before she went. I loved to cake on the light green and blue cream eyeshadow. Mom swears she didn't wipe it off. She really loved me.

My favorite childhood activity was sitting in the apple tree in our backyard reading Nancy Drew mysteries. Isn't that the quaintest thing you've heard all day? I loved books and would read five or six of them a week. I wrote my first story when I was seven, my first play the same year.

I was always attracted to spiritual things. I really, really wanted to be good, and to get to Heaven some day. Still do.

I could tell you more about Little Cathy, lots more. Some of it would make you laugh, and a lot of it would make you cry. Fortunately, like it or not, she's always nearby. Hang around here long enough and you'll get another peek soon enough.

from the childhood shelf

Have you ever wanted to run away from home?

No, not now, because your spouse and kids are driving you crazy. I mean, when you were little, did you want to pack up a suitcase with the essentials (teddy bear, crackers, and Things With Which to Survive) and head off to somewhere "better?"

I used to dream of going someplace exotic like the seashore or better yet, a tree house. These fantasies were no doubt fueled by this book, one of my childhood favorites.

My boys have the day off from school today, and Luke just packed up a suitcase and announced he's "walking and swimming to Hawaii." I'm with ya, son.

It made me think of this book, which survived my many readings to land on my kids' shelf. How I love it.

"So we packed our bag with sweaters and socks
and scarlet leaves and gold
and a frog who was a particular friend
and precious stones that caught and held the sun."

Pure poetry.

Makes me want to pack a suitcase and go exploring.

Don't worry. I'll be back in time for dinner.

Grandma's beads

When I was six years old, I loved to visit my grandmother's apartment. She lived on the ninth floor of a local senior's building, and from her balcony we could see the "skyscrapers" of the big city reaching for the clouds. My brother and I ran to the window when we got there, signing the 60's hit "Downtown."

After a chorus or two of "downtown, dadadadadadaaaa..." my next stop was my grandma's nightstand drawer. That's where she kept the most beautiful thing my young brown eyes had ever seen -- a set of rosary beads crafted from white plastic. Each bead was fashioned into a rosebud, and they were linked together by a silver chain. I felt like a princess when I put these around my neck and pranced around the apartment. Grandma let me wear them until it was time to go, when I reluctantly placed them back in her room. I couldn't wait to visit again, when I could gather up this precious "necklace" that made me feel pretty and special.

I know that rosaries are not jewelry, but that childhood experience gave me a love for Mama's Beads. I had the good fortune of belonging to a parish at which the rosary was prayed before each and every mass, and every Sunday, at my father's insistence, we arrived early enough to join in. Like most children, I was bored sometimes as I knelt there watching the beads slip through my fingers. But the habit was developed, and the comforting repetition of the familiar prayers soothed me and brought me focus and calm.

I don't remember praying the rosary much during my teen years, but I do have one vivid memory of Mr. Ted, a fiesty, outspoken lover of our Lady who taught catechism (as we called it then) to us after school. My brother and I arrived with our family at Sunday mass, and we were sitting in the car preparing to go in. Mr. Ted banged on the car window, frantically waving his beads. "Don't forget your rosaries!" he admonished my brother and me. We were mortified, embarrassed at his ridiculous behavior, so we went into church, laughing at his crazy zeal -- rosaries in hand, of course.

I can clearly recall the day I returned to the rosary as a young mother. Rachel, my firstborn, was napping, and I decided to pray the rosary. I couldn't remember the mysteries, so I got out the huge family bible my parents had given us as a wedding gift. I opened it to the pages that featured the mysteries, highlighted with large color pictures, and placed it in the baby's playpen. Then I knelt there with my beads and the sun lit up my tiny apartment. It was so incredibly quiet and peaceful and I felt, for the first time in years, like I was home.

The rosary became my companion then. I must have prayed it a thousand times during those early years of my marriage, particularly when my girls attended a school some miles away. Getting in the car meant praying the rosary. I often think that those many rosaries I prayed during those years protected and prepared us for the many challenges we would face in years to come.

We prayed the family rosary, too, alternately nudging the children to either stop pestering one another or stay awake. We discovered the rosary was the very best way to calm ourselves (even the experts acknowledged that praying and meditating this way lowered blood pressure!) Sometimes the kids balked, but we did it anyway. They, too, began to develop the habit that I know will bring them peace throughout their lives.

In difficult times I have wished I could return to Grandma's apartment and dance around like a princess without a care. Instead I turn to the beads that I learned to love there. When my baby Celeste was living and dying in the hospital, Aaron and I prayed the rosary on each drive there and back. It was all we could do. It was everything we could do. I was sometimes numb as the cool beads slipped through my fingers, tears streaming down my cheeks. But I could see Jesus and Mary clearly in my mind as I tried to focus on their lives, their sufferings and joys, instead of my own anguish. I could not find adequate words with which to pray. I didn't need to search for them. I could pray the sweet, familiar prayers of the rosary, and I would be comforted, healed and protected.

Today I most often pray the rosary at Adoration, where I sit with my elderly father as well-worn black beads slip through his fingers. I have many rosaries (of course I do! Such pretty princess beads!) but my current favorite is the set that my husband bought me soon after Celeste's death. These beads are little pink hearts, and they speak of my little girl. They make me feel like a little girl, as well, and I realize that's just what I am when I pray -- Mama's little girl.

The rosary makes me feel like a child, safe in my mother's arms. Maybe it's my early experience with my grandmother's rosary that makes me feel like a little girl every time I pray the rosary. Or maybe it's just that that's truly what I become when I pray this way.

Perhaps someday a little girl will go to her grandmother's nightstand and gather up a rosary strung with tender pink hearts. Maybe she'll dance around, wearing it like a necklace, feeling like a princess. I hope so.

I still have the white plastic roses. I received them when my grandma died, when I was only seven. They are the only remembrance I was given. They are enough.