Puff the Magic Dragon a morning in December.

Acting as Mother to my children


Investing myself into my children’s lives in the earlier times was mothering. They were with me. They were learning and doing and growing with me. Now it is appearances as mother. I dress myself up and study my responses and act as mother to my children. I am no longer, really their mother. I am part of a team of acting mothers. Maybe, I am the most influential of the mothers, maybe the lioness is more influential, maybe the prophetess and maybe the teacher, but, I am one of the mothers in their lives. I felt a little sense of some restoration of some of the influence today, that was stolen and snatched from me. I looked in my son’s eyes and performed, inadvertently Puff! I didn’t mean to perform it, I just meant for him to hear it. It was as powerful as Quiet Thing! I wasn’t expecting that response, but it was more exciting than a standing ovation. I was singing into his soul, as it were. The moment came and the tears started streaming down his face. What is wrong my son? Perhaps he thought the little boy had died. I really didn’t have the time to delve into what he was seeing while I was singing Puff. I remember in Kindergarten saying why are they making us sing this sad, sad song? This isn’t fun at all. I remember picturing Puff going into his cave with his ceiling wax and pasting up the walls and ceilings and not coming back out. I remember saying, I would go and play with Puff, even if I was grown up. I went back to the cave with my Ethan. The son of my emotions. The son born of the last of my serotonin. Tears and tears for Jackie Paper and Puff, whose love story was over, all too soon. We cried together this morning. We learned the lesson to enjoy the season where we are, perhaps it is a restoration of my maternal influences. Perhaps it is just a spark of past influences that were stolen from under me. God knows.




“Puff the Magic Dragon, ceased his fearless roar” and tears hit the ground. Hugs and kisses couldn’t comfort him at that thought. What will he do without his roar, mommy? Why didn’t Jackie Paper come back mommy? I don’t know, my son there are lessons that we will share about this, until we die, but God Bless Pete Seager, who took us to the crux of the matter this morning. Life has been given us to richly enjoy. And the children of the aged people deserve the same love as the children of the youth. God seems to bless and emphasize what we say more, now that we have less time to speak into their souls.

Making these boys see oneanother as teammates and not opponents is the goal of the season. A brother, is born for adversity. Enoch asked for one, Ethan asked for one and now there are three. My three sons. Crying and dancing in the morning, with Puff the Magic Dragon. I could not ask for more.

And I love her?

I got permission to tell the secret. Ethan has an admiration. I don't remember any of my children being so forward on such things and it is so refreshing to see love blooming at age 11. She has a powerful left hook, was the confession that was the real reason why she is Christmas present worthy. We all love her now. The cat is out of the bag.

Love in a big family is a group hug. When can I ask her to be my girlfriend? When you are 20. When can we marry? When you are thirty. The answers are in place and the communication is open. I love that we can talk about such things with human and maternal-child abandon. I think that this perfect communication beats the nursing years by a longshot. I'll keep you posted on the response to the Christmas card and gift.

Are you For Real?

The Velveteen Rabbit, discussed the question of the reality of a person or velveteen rabbit, as the case may be.
Throughout life, with trial and error to guide us, we learn that there are safe and unsafe people to expose ourselves to. Some books show us characters that can help us be discerning, as well as the Holy Spirit and the Bible's wise direction. We are all camouflaged in so many layers. God's people are camouflaged and show only a portion of their reality to the world. We are, in reality, seated in heavenly places with Christ and we look to be struggling and poor and needy and all too often sorry, yet God has chosen to cover us for His Glory, that He alone and those with Him can see the glory of the life in the presence of God.

"Tis only the glory of light, that hideth Thee"

God is hidden under the clothing of the light, which is dimness of the goodness of His true and real presence. The closer we get to His presence we realize how He is covered for our own protection. God is good and far better than He even shows Himself in our human vision. He is far more good than we can even know. His goodness is hidden. In our dark providences, it is hidden under the imagination that we think He doesn't care. In our comfortable providences it is hidden in the mistaken imagination that we deserve His goodness showered upon us. He is the best clandestine. He loves us more than we can sense. How great is the Father's love upon us, that we should be called the children of God. It is a hidden truth and no matter how many layers of that truth we uncover, there are an infinite number of layers to unwrap of His goodness.
Those who know Him not in the pardon of their sins in Christ, are hidden in His present goodness from the reality of the wrath of God hovering over their heads. God is too good to condemn them without a trial. God is too good to even give them a glimpse of their real condition without tempering it with the offer of His manifold grace in Christ.

The world is spinning and you, as the ballet dancer, through life must stay focused on your identity in Christ, to keep from tumbling down and hurting yourself.
Do not give your strength to women, says the mother in Proverbs 31. Do not think that any person on earth can hold your true identity and love you like God. He alone can know the real you. Treasure those who love you in truth and reality and do not deceive yourself that you are better than you are. There is no better place to be than redeemed. The icing of his comforts are pleasures, but He is better than that.

Why did God make you and all things? For His own glory.

What do you do when you lose the game?

I am certainly not a good loser. I have had coaches and people in my life, who have taught me how to lose gracefully. It is a coaches job, more to teach you how to approach your opponent after a loss, than after a win. In my expression, I shake the other person's hand and smile and say, good game. Yvonne Goolagong is my utmost image of the amazing way to show style in a loss. Her smile was infectious. I think that, even as a man, you can show style in a loss. I intend to change my strategy and practice harder to win the next time, but for now, you were the better man on the court. That is the sentiment of our outward expression.
During the match, I want to always see John McEnroe. "I have every intention of vanquishing you." That is the manly way in conflicts. It is hard to evoke that intensity of intension, when one is not in competitions. Conflicts are inevitable and losses are inevitable.
Always win, but if you can't win, look good losing.

This morning the drama was about money.

This middleschooler will make a good, used car salesman. Its only 20 dollars for the cards they are selling. We don't have to buy them, we can sell them? Right mom? It started yesterday. I had hardly gotten in the door when, my happy middleschool boy came at me with a paper. I said what I always say. Don't come at me with anything to read or sign for at least 15 minutes or until after my nap;) LOL. He wouldn't be daunted. Its only the paper for school. We owe 15 dollars for the lost book, we owe 3 dollars for the field trip and... this. Just put it down and I will get to it, erelong. They know, by now, that ere long is just that...ere long. Evie came and plopped on my bed and I tried to dislodge her from my body, but it was to no avail, she was going to be there until whatever it was was off her chest. {Why don't they make cribs for teenagers?} On and on, about this and that. New exercises in PE and how her hair will not behave and what is she going to do, if she doesn't get this or that... and the phone rang. It was the Middle school, thank you, the Principal called to read the white paper to me over the phone, How great is that! Now I don't have to use my brain. Oh, is that what all that fuss about the white paper was about, all the while Evie is turning blue holding her breath about the shoe crisis and the bus and something or other{thank God, nothing about any boys was in the mix}. I was glad for an adult voice over the phone to break up the teentalk. I do love it, I just needed a little time to get acclamated to the intensity. I played the phone call 3x. Ev was rolling her eyes and then we hung up. We made fun of the principal's voice for a few minutes and... the phone rang again. It was the Highschool principal, this is news for a teenager. Yippee, this is important mom, are you listening? Are we going to the football game? Do you think my friends will be there? Is there anything else more important than the football game? NO! That is enough. Why didn't you play the message 3 times like you did the other one? Now back to the news of the day...{I do love mothering a gadabout} The other Highschooler is more on the order of myself. I wouldn't know a thing about his life, if he hadn't a gregarious baby sister to newscast for him. I get back what I gave to my mother. Jayne, what happened today at school, "nothing". That is my Enoch. His mother's son. I'd better check on him, though, it is a little too quiet for the first month of school.
Evie and I were just in the middle of a playful kickfight when Dad, Ben came in to call a meeting. The crescendo of the evening. Anyway, this blog is about my middleschool boy and the tales he keeps me going with. I just love the way teenagers seem to take over the middleschool mothering project. I will watch for that.
Ethan made it to the bus and on time too.;)

MiddleSchool, Learning to decide?

Do you want cereal for breakfast? No, I want eggs. I made eggs today, for you. Before you ate the eggs, you wanted the cereal again. I gave you a couple of times to make that decision.
Everything is up for discussion. I don't mind discussing. I just want you to realize that you have to stand by your decisions, in the little and in the large. I really see what my father said about his relationship between self control and maternal care. What good is a mother? A mother forces the issue, of decision. If you are going to make your mother slave over a hot "microwave" for a whole 2 minutes, you'd better eat those eggs. This is a picture of everything you do in life. Reason from the lesser to the greater. That is the birth of circular reasoning. When the nation is full of princes it is under a curse. Everybody having total self determination and not sensitizing themselves to the care of mother, sucks the life out of a nation or people group. People who ride their mommies to an early grave depleats the land of the greatest creature comfort. You don't do that!

Its a Lovely 11th Birthday

I celebrated it my way. My very best friend came over. All my brothers and sisters were here. I sang and danced all night and we ended with a cheer.
11 great balloons around the place. Blow out the candles, happy face. 1, 2 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. 11 is the number for me!

Field day remembrances!

"Con-Gradulations!"

Baby Ethan was the first of our babies born after Grandpa Walker passed.

He met Grandpa Tony and Grandma Ruth and actually put a smile on her face. Aunt Gail encouraged me so much in that season. She said I want to thank you for having that baby, Jayne. I know it is very hard, but everytime that I think of Ethan, I see my mother's last smiles. I couldn't believe that my baby could make Grandma Ruth smile in her worst moments. Now he is graduating from elementary school and we are seeing an amazing young man develop. I just love watching him grow.
He is Ethan, My Grandpa was Ethan, Ben's Grandpa was James. We have several nicknames for him. "Ethan, James, Montgomery, Isaac, Newtron, Walker" That is quite a huge nickname to live up to.

Can I read to you, Mommy?

I am so sorry that I was tired not to hear you read your preciously, newly discovered C.S. Lewis. I love that you are entranced in the pages and swung along ambitiously to see what happens next. I love that you are imbibing the mind of such a master of the English language. It can only do good to your mind and soul to be apprenticed in your youth to someone of such amazing talent and Christian testimony. I was tired, dearest. I will try to listen tonight.

Mommy's tooth necklace?

We found the tooth that the tooth fairy dropped on the way out the door. We must have caught her, carrying it to her carriage and she dropped it. I was wondering why you didn't get a quarter for that tooth? Weren't you?

Another Charrette, to write a sentence? :)

I love the amount of time that you take talking about something and the amount of time that you take completing it. If you talked about it a little less and wrote a little more, we would have been alright with this one. 5 paragraphs? 2 hours the most? How about 8 hours! I do love wrestling language out of you talking walkers. What do I say? What do I say about it? I said this and this and this. You said 500 paragraphs about the terrier. Let's boil the water and boil it down to only 5 paragraphs. Which ones? Which paragraphs? Mom, just because I said that doesn't mean it goes into the project. Why not? You are late. I am learning about you through these inconveniences. I am learning which paragraphs in the Walker word store, you will lose and which you will keep. No, mom, I can't say that. Why? You said it a hundred times to me. Because!
Because, means I don't understand that there are rules that the teacher laid down and the million words that he used to describe the terrier, don't make the cut. Okay! Make the cut already. I stand on the sidelines and watch the words run by Ethan and he is making the last cut, here and there. This goes, this stays. A tedious process for Walkers. I can see why now, with my 5th one wrestling with me. They are players and some of them look good and some of them sound good, but only the best will get into the 5 paragraphs. I could not imagine that philosophy when I was helping Ben, or Elyse, or any of the other Walkers, here and there. Ethy speaks my language and is comfortable enough to tell me the difference. Pick that one, I say. No! There has to be an argument, or it isn't worth the effort. Last minute ditch effort or not, there will be a fight. I am learning to love the wrestle.

Ethan, the Ezrahite? "I will sing of the mercies of the Lord, Forever!"

I loved how you were listening to the word of God, last night, son of my womb. Immediately, you turned to find Zachariah, upon hearing his name brought up, in the book of Ezra that we were studying. That is thinking. That is reasoning. How come, Zechariah is way back there and Ezra is way up here? I love it. Keep the questions coming. The God who delivers and opens our minds to know Him, has encapsulated His heart and lovesong to us and we have access to God, by grace and through the blood of Jesus. Keep finding out about Him. He is eternal and we will never learn too much about Him.

Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet...

Holy Bible, Book divine,
Precious treasure, thou art mine:
Mine to tell me whence I came,
Mine to teach me what I am;

Mine to chide me when I rove,
Mine to show a Saviour's love;
Mine thou art to guide and guard,
Mine to punish or reward;

Mine to comfort in distress,
Suff'ring in this wilderness;
Mine to show, by living faith
Man can triumph over death;

Mine to tell of joys to come
And the rebel sinner's doom:
O thou holy Book divine,
Precious treasure, thou art mine.

Day 3 of Spring Break.

Yesterday was watering day and look, Crepe Myrtle has gotten her leaves.
All at once, overnight she has bloomed. Some people are like that. I think that you are a spring bloomer. What a good reader and an inquisitive fellow you are. Don't stop blooming, because of discouragement or unbelief. Keep stretching your mind and eye to the sky, like crepe myrtle does and you will see things and learn things and see more of God the more that you study.

Teach me how to sew.

My tailor son, we had lesson one. Threading the needle. What is sewing? Sewing is putting 2 pieces of fabric together and making one fabric. We did a sample of it. Ultimately, you want to patch your jeans. We will get to that. For now we did the simple 1-2 stitch. I love your inquiries. I see that you are the truthtester of the 3. No, is your favorite word. It isn't no, I will not do that? It is no, that is not accurate. I do like that. It is a challenge to me. Baby brother, loves to compliment Mommy and see the gleam of comfort on my face. Older brother likes to avoid my lavish expressions of love. You love the quizical look. What did you mean by that? Is what I am always saying about you.
I noticed it when we were in the hospital together. The nurses would say something and you would contribute to what they said instead of accepting it. What a boy you are! I am learning to mother you. Be patient with me.

When the Rubber met the road, the car didn't run:(

I don't know what happened, but the balloon didn't push the car and it didn't go. I am sorry honey. You should have had big sister go to school with you. I know that you were probably nervous. I love you and I know you tried to get that car to go. It didn't work, in the crunch.

The tracks of my tears.

Not until the sun hit your face did I see the tracks of tears that were left on your face from the harrowing car episode.
The CAR DO MOVE, now! Finally, after the 150th time the balloon moved the car. Dozens of design changes. Hundreds of attempts and finally the 23 year old help was the touch that it called for. Thanks to the help of the siblings life is better and you shan't fail. Thank you brothers for working with Ethan to get that car on the perverbial road.

Graduation meeting is February 22!

Wow, Grammar school graduate? We have a few months left of grammar school to get it together. Middle school is on the horizon.
Please remind me of the meeting. I really don't want to miss it. You are so special and there is so much that I want to teach you in these last months of Grammar School. There is so much to talk about and not enough time to talk about it. I love the way you think about solutions to problems and the things that are around you. I love the sword picture that you gave me and I am still going to get a frame to put it in. Keep up the work.

Respect Your Elders! This is Black History Month

Who is...

Frederick Douglass

What are we free to do? We are free to serve the Lord. God set us free. From from the bondages of slavery, free from the lacks of civil rights. So that we can show the abundance of the appreciation for the freedoms that we enjoy. Why are you dancing? God has set us free. God has delivered us from shackles of bondage. Bondage to human oppressions. Bondage to self made limitations. Can you legislate ignorance? Can you keep a human from using his God given mental ability? Can you limit people in their bodies or minds? God knows.

He whom the Son sets free is free indeed.

It is truly a shame, that those whose lives and hearts and minds were spared from the sea and ankles and wrists, delivered from the shackles of oppression; if we should take our shackles and link ourselves to ignorance, after this. To whom much is given, much is required. Much liberty, much responsibility. Much sense of gratitude because of the great deliverances from God, much responsibility to use those freedoms to glorify Him. What if the Jews had continued in idolatry, after having been delivered from the slavery to Egypt? Judgement! God said, He would kill them. Moses interceded for them. God has done great things for us, whereof we should be glad.

It is Black History Month, my son. It is time to remember that God has delivered us, into the sunshine of His Love. Into the sunshine of a redeemer, not just for our bodies, but for our souls. Not just a physical deliverance from the shackles of our arms and legs, but the shackles of our hearts and minds and souls. We are God's handiwork. We were blessed with a history of many who have contributed to shine the light.
Frederick Douglass- an advocate for education and mental acumen. Sharpen your mind and make full use of your faculties!

Hello, Fifth Grader!

Are you doing your work?
Last night I got my favorite present from you. On my pillow, was a folder full of work that was done by your hands, with varied marks on them. Some very good, most, were very good.
I admire the humility that put it on my pillow. I admire the beauty that you didn't flaunt your handiwork in your siblings faces. You did well, my son. You are really learning, it seems. You are asking the questions that will lead you to your purpose, under the direction of God. I love you, and Jesus has given us the grace and help to worship Him with our minds. Continue on.

Shot put detail went successfully today!

Why can't we get on the busstop early everyday?

Laundry? Prep? Breakfast? Its the same everyday, but a cog in the wheel each morning makes the routine a memory, everyday.

Its a harrowing lifestyle, but all too familiar. All too soon, they'll be gone and the hush, like the hush of the hawks nest that I passed the other day will be nothing but a memory.

The memories of the screams and squeals of the happy home. The crazy home, but the happy home.

Catching a second wind?

I remember the feeling of my body baking under the summer sun and then the relief when one cloud would cover the sun and a breath of cool air would seem to refresh in the midst of a match. Especially at Rochdale where there were no trees or shaded areas. The heat seemed to bake into your skin and eyes and then a cloud would cover the sun and it seemed the best refreshment for the moment.

It is spring today in January, maybe they call it Indian summer, down here, but I call 69 degrees a heat wave. I am so glad that I got outside to make acquaintance with a little cloud who reminded me of a cloud that I met when I was a child and playing the longest match of my life. I played and played and it seemed the only relief was that little cloud and I thought I wouldn’t make it another step 3 hours of constant pushing, as they teased us that we were. A bunch of little pushers. Just one more ball over the net. Dad said I couldn’t do it. He was the boss, and I did it. I beat Margo Smiley. 3 hours and I had beaten her. He couldn’t believe that I could beat somebody grown up like that, in the heat of the Rochdale sun. The sun was nearly down when we finished and I was glad it was. I was too hot for words and there was no word for the sense of elation that I had won over my own limitations of myself. I am my worst enemy;now as well as then. Catching a second wind.

Three Kings day has come and gone.

We have to take down the Christmas items. This is a day where the gifts of the Magi are remembered. Great Men still seek the Lord. Using our intellect to worship and follow the True and Living God, will always be the call for the believer. Let us not be those who close our minds and dumb ourselves down, for want of comradery.
Daniel's testimony of intelligence and the fear of the Lord has forged godly influences throughout the cultures. God gave him the liberty to use his mind and authority for the glory of the Lord, in an ungodly government. God blessed the world, during his time and us because of the mission that he was sent on. Don't be afraid to pursue mental challenges, God will always be proven true and every untruth will always, ultimately bow the knee to Him.

Read Good Books, my boy!

Kidnapped, By Robert Louis Stevenson. I am elated. Read with me and see what beauty there is in the revelation of God in the Sapiens of the creation. I love that you chose that book.