Pooh

He came flying around the corner the other day and said, "Did you see that picture of Pooh, Mom? Do you like it?"
"Yes, I like it!" I said. "I like it a lot!"
Todd had taken a picture of Pooh and made it our computer wallpaper.
 And then I had epiphany  of sorts. "Would you like if we'd get it framed?"

You could see the wheels of his mind start turning, "How could you frame it?" He asked.
"We'd get it printed at Walmart, and buy a frame for it. You could keep it on your dresser."
"Oh yes! Yes! YES!!" Wild excitement spurted out all over him.
And off he went, leaving in his wake his mom drifting down a silent brook of memories...to the day when Pooh first entered his life.

Todd was due on August the 10th. I remember that date because I had to repeat it so often to little Regan. She could not WAIT for him to be born. I couldn't either. It had been awhile since we had a baby in the house. Frankly, I preferred motherhood to pregnancy a thousand times over, and this pregnancy had had its share of scares and bed rest and hospital visits. It had been a long nine months.

But the 10th of August came and went, and no baby. Another week passed and another came. And finally, with some help from the doctor, Todd Asher was born, 12 days late. I remember us looking at him the first time... Todd in my arms; the Chief, who deserved a medal denoting supreme courage and endurance, as do most husbands of new mothers, to my right, hovering above us both. Todd was our fifth child and fourth son.

We couldn't have been happier.

The nurse whisked him away to be weighed and foot printed and brought his certificate with his little prints on it, to show us. His footprints were goofy, oddly smudged around his toes, and I kidded the nurse about her not getting his toe prints right. She laughed a little and made some comment about having had trouble with it.

That was a clue. I missed it.

They brought him back, weighed, and swaddled and ready to eat.
And they left us alone, the three of us. But, despite his apparent hunger, he seemed to have trouble sucking. Another nurse came to see if she could help, and in just a moment, with no word of explanation, she put her finger into his mouth, and then quietly took him from me and left the room.

That was another clue. But I wasn't looking for clues. I had just had a baby.

She brought him back to us again. I picked up his little hand  to adore its tininess. A couple of the fingers fell away from it at an odd angle. His pinkie finger had two fingernails, and upon investigation, seemed to be two fingers together. I showed it to The Chief. He had seen it earlier, and hadn't said anything.

That was a third clue. A couple questions rippled through my mind, but I felt no particular alarm.

Later, when we were settled into our room, the pediatrician came in and pulled up a chair. He was nice enough, but he wasn't our regular pediatrician, and we had no established relationship with him.

"Your little boy," he said, "was born with a few birth defects. Major minors I would call them."
 He launched into a run-down of the things he had been able to observe to that point. He was matter-of-fact, but not unkind. Todd's toes overlapped each other. His right hand had significant defects. He had a cleft in his soft palate...I forget if he mentioned other things then or not. I was unfazed. I loved the mothering job. If Todd took more mothering, I'd give it to him. Simple as that.

The most apparent defect at that point was that he was born with a cleft of the soft palate. This meant his mouth was open into his nasal cavity. He was unable to create suction, making nursing impossible. The nurse showed me how to feed him. I put his milk in a miniature cup and then holding him up-right on my knees, I held the little cup to his lips and he sip-sip-sipped it off, like a pro. Like he had known all along how to do this. I was disbelieving.

Later, they gave me a bottle nipple created especially for babies with cleft palates. He learned to strip the milk from it with his tongue. No suction necessary, but regulating the flow was tricky, and  it ran from his nose and half-drowned him over and over and over. Feeding him was a very long process. It nearly consumed my life. I was determined to keep from feeding him formula as long as possible, so he would have every possible benefit from my own milk. But determination cannot scale every mountain. I capitulated after about a month and a half and started feeding him formula, trying not so successfully to shrug off the guilt.

Thinking about it now, I still cry a little. Mom-guilt is a mantle the fingers of reason are unable to lift from your shoulders.

And we began seeing doctors. So many doctors. About This. About That. He needs this test. And that test. And these x-rays. And those therapists. And this specialist. And that procedure. He should be checked for possible syndromes. And this panel should have a look at him.

The endless labyrinth of halls that is MCG took on a familiarity we could never have envisioned. The security guards at the parking garage became common acquaintances. I learned to know the parking garage, how to extract myself from the predictable caterpillar of cars that crawled its way from floor to crowded floor, and snag the parking spots less apparent to the uninitiated.

Todd's plastic surgeon said doing cleft palate surgery was most successful and effective when done at approximately eight months old. I looked forward to that day, and dreaded it at the same time. It was his first major surgery.

We went through what would in later years become conventional routine. Pre-op. No eating after midnight. Keeping him occupied and entertained until they called us back. Trying to act, for his sake, like it was no biggie, like everything would be fine. We purposed to stay with him as long as we could and asked the doctor if we could go back to the operating room and stay with him till the anesthesia claimed him.

And then we walked, just the Chief and I, back to the waiting room alone, to wait. And wait. In a room full of other parents and grandparents trying to entertain and pacify other little children who hadn't eaten since midnight.

Finally the surgeon came out and told us surgery was complete and he was happy with how it went. They had sewn a string through his tongue he said, and it would be hanging out of his mouth. It was necessary should his airway begin to swell, we could pull his tongue out and free his breathing.

He left, and we waited some more.

And then the door opened, and a nurse called "Strite". We followed her back as she gave us a brief run-down of  his condition.

And there he was, one baby boy in a whole row of little people in varying stages of anesthesia's spell, separated by curtains.

I was unprepared for how pitiful he was. He was so small and awful in that ill-fitting hospital gown, with that string hanging out of his bloody mouth.  When he woke his eyes brimmed with unspoken confusion, fear, and anguish.

I hid my own anguish. Or tried.

Once he was properly awake they moved us all together into a recovery room. The Chief carrying the plastic drawstring bag probably, with Todd's own clothes. The nurse with the IV pole. Me, with Todd. That's how it usually worked.

The room was dim and pretty small. The obligatory shades of gray in every direction. Except for one spot. One big Spot of Gold with black eyes and nose and a bright red sweater.

It was Pooh. Waiting patiently for his boy to get there. There was a piece of paper there with him.  I can't remember the exact wording, but it said something like: This bear has been donated by...I think her name was Carolyn something, during a WBBQ fund drive for the patients at the MCG Children's Medical Center.

It was a tough couple days for Todd, and for the Chief and me. The only thing you can do for a baby that age is try to convey your love for them through the pain, and hope they understand that much at least...that you are there, and will not leave. That's all you have. It seems so inadequate.

All the while Pooh sat calmly in the corner of the vinyl couch, waiting.

And then it was time to go home, and we loaded him up with all the other things...the prescriptions, the instructions, the discharge papers, and this and that.

And off he went to his new home, with his new boy. There was no way we perceived how important a bear he was.

Todd quickly came to adore Pooh. He took him to bed with him faithfully every night....Pooh sat beside him where he played.
And they grew...Well, Todd grew...Pooh pretty much stayed the same. He dressed him in his own pants in the morning, (they were short pants on Todd, long pants on Pooh.)...and put him in pj's at night. Todd grew out of the pants, but Pooh didn't. He keeps a pair or two to this day, in case Pooh is in a pants-wearing mood.

They have had parties together. And gone to grandmother's house. And camping.
He talks for Pooh when Pooh can't find the words to speak... a little boy who for years struggled to find his own voice.

Sometimes Pooh needs a bath, at which point Todd keeps careful track of the washing machine and how soon he'll be out again. And then of course, he needs drying...and it takes so LONG for him to dry! But he's pretty and golden again then. Just like new! And his little sweater is so bright!

Todd and Pooh are ten years old now. Todd has changed a lot. Pooh, not so much.

Todd has been through multiple surgeries in those ten years. That cleft palate surgery was just one of many. But Pooh has been a constant in his life from that first one.

And often when I see them together, and think how much happiness Pooh has brought to Todd over the years, nearly his entire life....I think of Carolyn. And I wish she knew.

Pooh's picture has now been printed and laminated, and today, I hope to find a frame.
Red, I think, to match his sweater. Or perhaps black, to bring out the color of his eyes.

Thank you, Carolyn...wherever you are. Thank you so much.

March, or whatever...

What do you do when you reeeally feel like writing but have nothing to write about??
We're about to see. Because that is the case.

My life has been like a handful of confetti for the last while, bits and pieces, flung...twirling, falling. The aftermath isn't especially tidy. Or noteworthy. Or sensible.

It's March now.

I wish for Spring one day. I wish for snow the next. Or even both the same instant. I think mostly I just wish for something besides sullen skies and drizmal. And coldness.

But I did plan The Garden of My Dreams. That was fun and not dependent at all on happy weather. You should see it, my dream garden.
I'd like to see it myself, actually. But I won't, I suppose.
The garden that comes to pass seldom bears overmuch resemblance to The Garden of my Dreams.

This takes none of the pleasure away from the dream, however. None.

The Chief ordered the seeds. He and a couple of the natives refurbished my little greenhouse. Last week I filled the first flats with potting soil and tucked in the first batch of seeds. Tomatoes and peppers of various varieties. Over 160 seeds in all. And some herbs.
A day or so later I planted more things, cone flowers, daisies, impatiens, coleus, caladium bulbs....more herbs...

A couple days later, eggplant, and okra and and I forget what all...and more herbs....

And the Chief said, "You planted the okra? We usually just plant that in the garden." Oh yes. I forgot.
I ran out of pots, so I bought more.

And planted more.

The Chief came home the next day and said, "Did you plant anything today?" And I said, "No, I ran out of pots again."

So now I am in the waiting stage. Waiting for more pots. But especially waiting for the first glad seedling sighting.

Truth be told there is nothing much gladder in the whole world than the first seedling sighting. Not for me. Every morning I take my rooster mug and fill it with steaming coffee and go check on my flats. I check the soil to see if it needs watering. And then I peer at the soil. And peer at the soil.

And peer at the soil.

This is more fun than you would believe. This is my absolute favorite hobby.

One day, I will see a miniature translucent palish arch emerging from the soil somewhere...out of all those hundreds of tiny pots. Because that's the first thing you see...and then that afternoon maybe, or the next day, one side of the arch will break free from the soil and there it will be! A little white stem topped by two baby leaves. A seedling!! And then there will be another one... and ten more...and dozens!!! It's entirely thrilling!

 I check them every morning, while I husp my coffee, and count them to see if there are more than last time. I look at them all carefully, note their progress, and try to discern if I'm killing them yet or not.
When I'm all through, I look at them one more time. And wish I had planted more so I would have more to look at.

Then I step out of the balmy earthiness of my little greenhouse, close the door behind me, and cradling my empty rooster mug, brace myself against the harsher realities of March.

So this is one fragment from the handful of confetti. And one, I believe, is enough.

I Took a Walk

I took, yesterday, in the interest of personal inventory reduction, a walk.

It shouldn't have felt as cold as it did, but there was no sun.  Twenty steps in I was huddled into myself and tucking in loose parts.

It's winter. I would say I don't like it, but that would mean spending 1/4 of my life not liking something, so I won't say that. Winter actually does have a couple redeeming qualities.

Snow, for instance, (which we rarely have). And ice for ice skating, (which we never have).

The other parts of winter I like are really not "liking winter" exactly, as much as enjoying the coping techniques.
Hot tea, for instance; Earl Grey in particular. Snuggling under covers in a chilly room. A Chief who cheerfully lets me put my freezing feet on him. Fire in the fireplace. (Not that we have one). Chili soup and corn bread.  Fuzzy socks. Long evenings for game-playing. And looking forward to spring.

Side virtues of dubious distinction, but virtues, none-the-less: I appreciate each one.

Outside, devoid of all these, I set out on my walk, under a canopy of naked, rattling branches, and a thin breeze cutting its way among the trees.

I pondered my crazy sister who lives farther north, who recently told me she LOVES winter! (I knew this before, she was just saying it again.)
They all do, she said. Her young son had slept the other night with his bedroom window open when it was 9 degrees outside. She made him keep his bedroom door shut she said, so the rest of the house wouldn't be 9 degrees.....(This judgement call of her's apparently redeeming her of all insanity. All I have to say is, "We report. You decide.")

But I thought of her and how she loves winter as I walked along, and contemplated the thought processes that would lead a person to love such a dark, cold, melancholy Thing. What was it like in her brain? I attempted to squeeze myself into it. It was an ill-fitting effort, and sizable parts of me dangled out the sides, but it was interesting to be sort of there.

I walked past the place where the resident coyote keeps appearing. I looked for him, but didn't see him. I turned the corner and headed up the hill. Smoke trailed on the breeze now and then, likely from someone's chimney. Someone with a fireplace.
A barred owl hooted from down near the creek. The forest floor was alive with pert squirrels who dashed noisily through crisp leaves and leaped to silent sentry positions against nearby tree trunks.

I got to the end of the lane and turned to walk down the hill. No cars. Geese gronk-gronk-gronked  off to my right. I watched as a trio of them flew above me and disappeared to the left over the swamp. Or is it a pond? It's a pond when it gets dammed up in front of the culvert that runs beneath the road, and empties on the far side. Sometimes there are beavers to dam it up. But sometimes there aren't. Right now, there aren't. Perhaps it gets a little local aid from surrounding humanity, I don't know. But it's nicest when it's a pond and right now it's a pond.
The sound of rushing water shut out the world. It was pleasant. The geese and the pond. Even on a cold gray day, it was all beautiful. It all fit, somehow. Maybe this was how it was to love winter.

I left the pond and walked up the hill. You burn more calories in cold weather. Another definite plus.
My phone rang. It was a friend. I walked along...or maybe sort of panted along...talking, walking, and burning extra calories thanks to the cold.

A car approached, the first I had seen. A little white car. I tried to flag it down. It blasted past, but then thought better of it and backed up. It's nice living on a road where you can back up without getting killed, and the only car that passes you has your husband in it.
I hopped in. It was nice and warm. I climbed out of my sister's brain and gave myself a good fluffing-up shake. It hadn't been altogether unpleasant there, perhaps sometime I would return. It was, at any rate, a reasonable survival technique.
 I think.
Unless winter makes you crazy without you really knowing.

In Lieu of Anything Substantive....

The Chief is working today...the boys went off to play football...the littles went to watch...which leaves Reg and me....
...and she is occupying herself....

So I went to the kitchen. It was lonely and sleepish and wished someone would come cheer it up. "I could do that, I suppose." I thought to myself.

I got out the skillet and a roasted chicken carcass. It still had some valuable chicken on it. I carved it offa there and put it in the pan with a little oil. And a little garlic, and some fresh pepper, and some cumin....and fried it a little, and piled it on a plate.

The kitchen opened its eyes and blinked.

I got an onion from the bin and peeled it and sliced some of it and put it in the pan. I put a little more oil in it, stirring it now and then till it was about right. I put it on the plate with the chicken.

The kitchen stretched and twitched its whiskers.

I got out my little white mixing bowl. It's just a perfect little crockery mixing bowl...but pretty small. Small was just right. I put a handful of flour in it, sprinkled in a little salt, a mere pinch of baking powder and then took my bowl to the spigot and ran some warmish water into it, stirred it up, kneaded it a little bit and rolled out a nice thin tortilla. I put my tortilla in the pan with some more oil. Fried it on one side. Fried it on the other side, and piled my chicken and onions on top of it.

The kitchen stretched and sat on its haunches.

I got the hot sauce and blooped it all over the chicken and onions.
I got the lettuce and cut a pile of lettuce over it.
I opened the sour cream and added some and drizzled a little Vidalia Onion Honey Mustard dressing on it, (from Woodside Kitchen, which makes the best dressing).

The kitchen began to flick the tip of its tail back and forth, back and forth..

I shredded just a little cheddar over it and and attempted to close the tortilla over top of it. Pfft.
Okay, so now what?
I got it over to my plate. It took all my hands and several pancake turners and custom tortilla-transferring skills.
I took a bite.

The kitchen purred. And smiled. I saw it smile. I think.

One Little Memory

Last year, we decided to go home and spend Christmas with Mother. She wasn't doing real well, and she had her special diet. She was pretty weak and short of breath. We stayed in her basement and took care of our own meals.... so different from every previous Christmas where she would wait on everyone hand and foot, and shoo off anyone who got in her way in the name of trying to help.

But we had such a good time!

 One day, I had a little shopping to do and asked her if she wanted to go, and lo and behold!, if she didn't decide she would! She never liked shopping especially.
"Go on!" She'd say, if we'd invite her, "I'm glad I don't hafta go anywhere."

But this time she said she'd go! So she and Regan and Todd and Becky and I went shopping. She wanted to show us off to her sisters. She thought they would be at the Farmer's Market eating, but they weren't. We went to her bank to deposit her paycheck.
 She wanted a flashlight, and she wanted a hook to hang her wreathe to her metal door. We found a strong magnet hook. Just what she wanted.  She turned up her nose at the expensive flashlights on display but the man at Rocking R Hardware found her one cheap enough to suit her. She leaned on me when she walked and she was breathless and exhausted till we were through, but we had great fun!

 When we got home she stuck her magnet to her door and unceremoniously tossed her wreathe over it with pert satisfaction. So like her...taking care of business without a bit of to-do.

I knew it was our last Christmas with her, barring some incredible miracle, and every moment  felt  like gold slipping through our fingers. She was there. So real. So alive. Yet impossible to hold. Time just moves forward. forward. forward....

I have a metal door. I have a wreathe. And now I have her magnet hook.
Merry Christmas,  Dear Mother. I know it will be heavenly.
But we miss you. Oh... we miss you.

Joy to the World, Y'all.

The wigwam has been hit with a scourge of historic proportion. Todd got it first, annihilating the travel plans the Chief and I were on the verge of implementing. I was the second victim. From there we dropped by ones and twos until the Chief at last succumbed. So we've had a week of dreaded symptoms answered by tonics, sleep, despair, and misery.

I am better now, the only one who's completely better...which is good on one hand, because somebody can take care of the fallen...and bad on the other, because a whole Sunday spent in a convalescent home has real potential for sending you to a home of a different sort.

So I am escaping to here, and lacking any cohesive stream of inspiration, I think I'll just post disconnected thought-bites pertaining to Christmas.

          ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~      ~*~     

 I think we should petition the powers-that-be to ban those giant inflatables that pop up like boils on the night landscape this time of year, and collapse in big puddles of vinyl by the dawn's early light. I will not call them Christmas decorations. Classing them as decorations of any description would be too kind, and even though they appear with the lights and wreaths and garland characteristic of the season, whether they have anything in world to do with Christmas is clearly entirely optional. Take, for instance, the big yellow chicken in our neighbor's yard, located next to the Eiffel Tower right there where their garden had been located.

The next neighbors have a gigantic green helicopter with a slowly rotating propeller in their yard among numerous other inflatable things. Santa is in it, and I suppose it is meant to serve as gentle comfort against realistic worries the reindeer union may strike for better working conditions just when they are most needed....I don't know!  But it ruins their otherwise beautiful lawn!!!
 White lights, people! Colored lights, even! Candles! Wreaths!
Anything! Anything but those vinyl things!

           ~*~    ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     

Christmas was entirely wonderful to me when I was a little girl.
I was analyzing the other day what made it so. The "Let's Make A Memory" enthusiasts would no-doubt be at a loss to find much. Mother "wrapped" all our gifts in brown paper grocery or lunch bags, taped them shut and scrawled the name of the recipient on it with a black magic marker. Maybe they had a bow stuck on top.
When we came down Christmas morning each child had his pile on one chair or spot on the couch. And Mother and Daddy had their spots too. We'd read the Christmas story, and maybe sing a few carols, alive with caged anticipation. And then we'd decide who would start... and we'd open gifts. I am sure they were modest gifts and certainly not numerous. I don't know that I can remember a single thing I ever got. But it was altogether wonderful, that much I know.

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One year, Mother bought a nativity scene. I think she got it at Glen's Fair Price.
Glen's Fair Price was a dusty, darkish shop in downtown Harrisonburg. Not the type of shop that will ever be a national chain, but the kind bursting with character, covered with dust, and crammed with second-hand stuff. I loved Glen's Fair Price.

The nativity scene had characters with slightly exaggerated poses and expressions, and they weren't fine porcelain, by any stretch, but when they were tucked inside that little stable and the lights were lit, I could sit  there entranced for long minutes, transported to another time and place by some artist's depiction of that first blessed Christmas.

          ~*~     ~*~    ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     

I think Christmas takes on a different aura when you find yourself in a position to be the one responsible for making memories for your own little people. At least, it did for me. The moms who create and implement all these beautiful and meaningful traditions to stock their children's memory banks full of haloed treasures, amaze and intimidate me. I bake special Christmas things, and two days later they are eaten, because I didn't quite get them to the freezer in time...and what else was there to eat anyway?

And what else do I do? Hmm I don't know. I do wrap their presents usually. Maybe only a day before Christmas... but they are wrapped. Not that it matters. It sure didn't matter to me.
I'm hoping a blanket of love and warmth will shroud their lack of concrete memories somehow....like maybe how wonderful it was when mom let them pack all those Christmas pecan tassies in their pre-Christmas school lunches.

          ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     

I love Christmas music. I do not get tired of it. I am not talking about secular Christmas music featuring Santa Claus....or Rudolf.....or grandma who met him and an untimely demise on Christmas eve. Or songs that were manufactured by recent artists to fill up the obligatory Christmas album. But I love the old songs. The ancient carols. The orchestra music. Handel's Glorious Messiah. Every year it is wonderful all over again.

         ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~     ~*~    

Some of those old songs have some phrases that bring me a lot of pleasure for a variety of reasons. Here's a sampling:

"E'en so here below, below,
Let steeple bells be swungen,
And "Io, io, io!"
By priest and people sungen."
       ~*~
"The Master of the Inn refused
A more commodious Place;
Ungenerous Soul of Savage Mould,
And destitute of Grace."
       ~*~
Bring the torch Jeanette Isabella!
Bring the torch and hurry and run!
He is born! Good folk of the village
Christ is born and Mary calls you
Ahh! Ahh! Beautiful is the mother!
Ahh! Ahh! Beautiful is the child!
       ~*~
I thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along th'unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.
       ~*~
And I love the "Bohm" at the very end of  Carol of the Bells, which is a supremely enchanting song from the first note to the last.

Nobody writes songs like that anymore.

Joy to your world this Christmas! Stay well!  God bless us, every one!

"Honey, You Need a Bath."

He needed a bath. He really did.
He wasn't going to want one, poor thing. But he needed one.
And he would feel so much better when he had had one.

I set about getting it ready for him. I set up the little space heater so it would be nice and warm. Then I put in the plug and turned the water on, tweaking it till the temperature seemed right.

Hmm, what else?
I found some of the Chief's body wash. "New!" it said. "Irish Spring Body Wash." "Legendary Classic."
How can it be both "new" and a "legendary classic?" I wondered.

These are questions with no answers.

I opened the lid and put it to my nose. Ahhh...nice.  I squirted some into the rushing water and watched as it exploded in a swirl of foam that rose and built.
 A masculine bubble bath. He would like it, I thought, andwatched the water pounding into the tub briefly before turning to the task at hand. A nice fluffy towel, laid out right here. A wash cloth there. Soap here. A cup to rinse his hair.

Okay then. He needed clothes.
I searched his drawers. Fresh underwear. Fresh socks. What should I get him to wear? I extracted a few things from his drawer that should have been in the hamper. "No wonder he's always low on clothes" I mused. "Why can't I teach him the dirty stuff does not go back in his drawer even if it's his favorite shirt?... Especially if it's his favorite shirt?"

More questions with no answers.

Jeans looked stiff and collared shirts seemed wrong.
I shut that drawer and opened his pj drawer. There lay a pair of red and black plaid fleece pj's. Nice, soft, clean, and folded. "Probably means they aren't his favorite." I thought. I had made them for his older brother, but they fit him now. A gentle reminder of the fleeting nature of little-boyhood.
They looked perfect from the mom angle. I would take them out and ask him if he wanted to wear them, I decided. I'd let him wear whatever he wanted.
As long as it was clean.

Gathering my collection of clothes and taking them to the livingroom, I stood there and watched him quietly for a minute as he slept.
He had been curled on that corner of the couch wrapped in his blanket since Sunday, venturing out now and then only when the Ibuprofen was doing its best work. The Tylenol helped some too, I guess, but not enough to inspire him to rouse much. He was burning up with fever. Keeping it down to 103 was a challenge.

Hair sprouted wildly from his head. His cheeks were bright and each breath was junky with mucus.
"Toddy, you need a bath." I said softly.

Without a word he pulled the covers over his head.

"Would you like to wear these pj's when you get out?" I asked.
He turned reluctantly to look at what I had with lids that hung heavy over languid eyes, and nodded.

I took them in and arranged all his clothes on the counter near the heater.
"Come on dearie. It's time to take your bath."

Like a lamb to the slaughter he came, surveyed my preparations and seemed weakly grateful. All he had to do was get in the tub. He peeled off his clothes and stuck a toe into the water. It was too hot.

I turned on the cold water while he perched, waiting, and when it was just right, I left him to his tub of new legendary classic bubbles.

In the living room I settled in my chair with my cup of coffee and opened my Bible to the place in Isaiah where I had been reading, and my eyes lit on one of my favorite verses of all time. "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound..."

They are prophetic words, speaking of Jesus, and are the very words Jesus stood and read in the temple at the beginning of His earthly ministry to humanity.

They echoed in my heart, and as many times before my eyes were opened to the similarities between the heart of God and the heart of a parent.

What a tender mission! Our heavenly Father in the flesh, sent to bind our wounds and free the captives. He came to a cold world, ravaged by spiritual illness.

And He set to nursing it back to health, mixing truth ("Honey, you need a bath") and mercy, ("Everything's here, dearie, all you need to do is get in.").

That's our Heavenly Father. The Gift of Christmas. Oh come, let us adore Him.