The Comfort of a Morning Dove

thewritingprofessor55

May 23

Hello from a few days of driving, visiting, managing, and grading,

Those four participles seem to describe the great majority of what my adult life is; traveling and meeting or reacquainting with those who have blessed my life is something dear to me. Managing the tasks, the work, and then commenting and evaluating the writing of my students often teaches me as much about myself as those in my classes. I actually enjoy helping students improve their skills and providing some small idea that finally clarifies whatever compositional issue has vexed them for most of their life. I love when the light goes on and their disdain for writing, at least momentarily, disappears. This is often some minor thing, but to them it matters. They feel accomplished; they feel like they have cleared some hurdle, which up to that point seemed insurmountable. I am continually stunned by the difficulty students seem to have with what my generation would have called basic skills. So much to unpack there, but not in this post.

There is a connection, however, between the initial paragraph and my title. While many people, and not just students, find writing and grammar formidable, I find it comforting. I like both the predictability and the creativity that language offers. I am enamored by what words do and how their order and the punctuational markings offer such insight into who we are. It is both a puzzle and process; something I am always trying to understand or interpret. The connection to the sound of a morning dove is also about comfort. Our senses are integral, and intrinsically connected to memory. When I was a small child, living on the small acreage at my grandparents, on the edge of our town, the morning dove's call is something I remember hearing daily. I loved the melodic and somewhat cooing that characterized their announcing they were in our many trees. That sound transports me yet today back to the simple farmhouse with its large kitchen, thoughtfully decorated, formal dining room, and cozy den. The images of the large from yard and small tiered backyard with incredible shade trees still bring a smile to my face and unparalleled joy to my heart. This morning I woke up to the sound of these amazing birds at my backyard feeder. They remind me of pigeons in a number of ways, but they are not as dirty (which I appreciate). When I remember my preschool days living with my grandparents, there are specific scenes that play through, much like the View-master, those handheld plastic sort-of-square-binocular things through which we looked at pictures of the world. I remember sitting on the back porch steps with my grandfather watching a Great-horned Owl, which initially frightened me both because of its size and its hooting. I remember sitting in the tin washtub taking a bath because there was no bathtub or shower in their house. I remember feeding my black cocker spaniel, named Penny. And all of this was before I turned three because my grandfather would die of cancer a month before my 3rd birthday. And yet those were happy times. They were safe times, and they were times I felt loved. It still astounds me, as it did both my grandmother and her older sister that I remembered so much from such an early age. I remember when I had surgery at Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona and telling my Great-aunt Helen things I recalled and she was stunned, as she replied, "You were barely two."

I think our psyche has an innate way it protects us through things we are "allowed" to remember. During that same time in my life, a dog jumped over the fence and into the yard. I can still remember the dog walking up to me. I do not, however, recall the moment the dog bit me, lacerating the side of my face. I can plainly see myself being carried into the hospital, but l do not remember the treatment or the stitches I received. And I have never been afraid of dogs to some degree. I can see the hospital sticker bed in the front living room, where my grandfather fought a losing battle with lung cancer, but I do not remember him being in pain, or his passing away. As noted, in spite of some extreme issues and consequences, my memories of all that time are quite positive. My grandmother became a widow at 45, and she would never remarry. She would pass away when she was 68, the age of my next birthday. That mile-marker does not go unnoticed to me.

The words I would use to describe my grandmother are somewhat complex as she was complex herself. She was the baby-girl of the three Hannestad sisters. She attended college at the University of Northern Iowa, reportedly to be a teacher. Yet, I think she returned home to the South Dakota farm because of the depression. I imagine it was a combination of her being needed on the farm as well as an issue of money. My grandmother was industrious and driven, and simultaneously, following the death of my grandfather, she suffered as an alcoholic. She was compassionate and loving, but seldom took time for herself, instead continuing to try the managing the Scandinavian Bakery. She was the owner, cake decorating genius, and simultaneously trying to raise her two grandchildren, in spite her struggles to hold life together as a new widow. She struggled nonetheless, and she attempted to manage that struggle, depression, and pressure as many would. If it were not for her elder sister, she would have lost her tremendously loyal workers and her business, but that did not happen. It was that alcoholism, and probably due to the time period that Kris, my sister, and I would be put up for adoption. Within a few years, she would turn things around with the help of AA, her church and Eastern Star, but she never ceased to be my grandmother (and the person who is to this day, my hero). I have noted much about her in previous blogs, but the thing that will always ring true was her unending love and her incomparable generosity. She would be 110 years old this year, but I wish she would have lived to see me get my act together more than she did. When she passed away shortly after my 22 birthday, my brother had passed only 7 months before, and I was a mess. I was certainly drinking more than I should; I was smoking pot, and I did inhale; and I was both clueless and directionless. I still remember her as an incredible combination of elegance and practicality. And yet, everything she did was because of her love of others. I wish she had lived to see the profound influence she had and how her lessons, from manners to giving to others is such an important part of who I am. Just this morning when I held the door open for someone (and they were more than a couple of feet away), they noted that I was very kind for waiting for them to the degree I did. My response was simple: its what my grandmother taught me. Amazing how those early prior-to-five examples created a foundation for my life.

Memories that are grounded in love, at least as I ponder my own life, are the ones that have been woven into the fabric of who I am. I have experienced living with someone who spent most of their life unhappy, angry, and mistrusting and it was exhausting and humiliating because one could never convince them or please them. It was painful, and for that reason I have worked both diligently and intentionally to not treat people from a place of anger. This is not to say there is not a time for anger. Anger is not right or wrong. It is an emotion and emotions cannot be argued. It is what we do with those emotions. And yet as I know that, I fall short of managing it from time to time. What I have learned as I age is to not dwell on any emotion for too long a time. Happiness will pass as will sadness; contentment with something or someone will also pass and it will be replaced with something else. And yet there is a general attitude we can choose (or at least attempt) as a general way in which we live our lives. Mine is one of optimism; one of believing every thing we experience has something positive in it. Even if it is not always immediately evident. There are clichés more numerous than our collective fingers and toes, but there are simply that. While I am not a Norman Vincent Peale follower, my grandmother was (it was another element of her post-drinking life). There is something to be said, however, for the "power of positive thinking." And yet, in all honesty, there is a melancholia to my optimism. There is a balance that reminds me there is a reality to our world. It is necessary to understand words like responsibility or accountability (and they are not the same) as well as experience their sometimes painful consequence. I have certainly had those times in my life, wondering what I might do next after getting knocked down. As I note for someone the other day, it will happen. The significance is what happens next. It is balance, in numerous ways and on multiple levels. I am a wondering and pondering person. The proverbial what if? never leaves my side, but I believe it is the constant that keeps me striving for yet another lesson to learn, another hurdle to jump. Some ask if it is tiring, and perhaps there are moments, but generally, as my students say, "I'm down for it," which, for those who might not know, means bring it. There is a simplicity in that. For me, it allows me to see each day as an opportunity or gift. For me, it provides yet something possible. And yet it grounds me in my past, keeping me aware of those small things that still give me comfort, those sounds that remind me of that special time in my life on the acreage out in the Leeds area of my Northwestern Iowa town. The call of a morning dove even this morning offers me the chance to remember a beautiful woman who loved me with all her heart, and to feel once again the safety that gave, and still gives, me hope. Sometimes when I am driving around listening to the songs that remind me of other times in my life, I find something that makes sense, and it is this Lynyrd Skynyrd song this morning. Hard to believe June is here already. It will be a busy, but special month and summer. Some traveling, some memorializing those who are significant to my life, celebrating in Europe with my exchange son and his family, and then reunion-ing with my high school friends from 50 years ago. It's been an amazing journey from that little boy who loved morning doves, and he still does.