The Mom Weekly

Category: Weekly Newsletter

  • Good Morning, Destroyer of Worlds

    Good Morning, Destroyer of Worlds

    The Mom Weekly Volume 98: June 24, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Good Morning, Destroyer of Worlds

    Many years ago, perhaps a decade ago? Our youngest child for some reason gave me an additional name on our Apple account—Destroyer of Worlds. I think he was in 8th grade or 9th grade, and it was doubtless a goofy thing to do for his mom.

    It seemed funny at the time, and it still does. I thought about changing it back, but I never did. After a short time, I enjoyed seeing it pop up. 

    “Destroyer of Worlds, your AirPods are no longer with you. They were last seen at …” 

    When I want to text myself something from my phone to my laptop or vice versa (for some use cases, better than AirDrop), I type in “Destroyer of Worlds” because while there are several Nancys in my contacts, there is only one Destroyer of Worlds.

    The other morning, I was up extra early, and I saw my watch say, “Good Morning, Destroyer of Worlds.” This only happens once in a great while, but when it did a few months ago, I took a photo. It makes me smile, every time. Yes, I am a Destroyer of Worlds. 

    Maybe you thought I was kidding?

    It’s become common advice to mind your inner monologue—to avoid negative self-talk, because it can be so damaging to ourselves and our relationships. Like most people, I have been prone to this over time. And I try to nip that negative self-talk in the bud, as much as possible.

    You know what helps? Being Destroyer of Worlds.It helps a lot.

    It helps me recognize that two things can be true at the same time. One can make mistakes, but good qualities, especially strength and fortitude, are present.

    Destroyer of Worlds may have burned a batch of cookies in the oven, but knows that she is in general, an excellent baker. 

    Destroyer of Worlds may not have the perfect thing to say when a friend or loved one is having a hard time, but she also is a thoughtful person in the lives of many that she knows. 

    Destroyer of Worlds may occasionally feel like she is a “bad mom” or has failed in some parenting choices. (Though, as I like to tell other moms—if you think you’re a bad mom, you’re not. Bad moms don’t think about that). But she is Destroyer of Worlds, and Destroyer of Worlds is a good mom.

    Anyway, I just want to say thank you to that 12 or 13-year-old son, who had the whimsical idea to add the moniker “Destroyer of Worlds” to his mom’s name. And that mom has found it a very helpful and affirmative name. 

    Remember how much I loves you,

    Destroyer of Worlds

    Notes

    As I prepared this, I thought, I better lightly research “Destroyer of Worlds.” Eek! I am virtually certain that the middle-schooler did not realize this when he named me thus, but who knows?

    It’s actually a line from the Hindu sacred text, the Bhagavad Gita. It was something that Robert Oppenheimer famously said after the Trinity nuclear test explosion at Los Alamos. You can read about it here.

    And here is a video of Oppenheimer describing the moment.

    How odd is it that Oppenheimer died when he was just a little older than I am right now (of throat cancer, from chain smoking for decades)? And also, he was not the greatest human. I listened to this podcast episode when the movie came out, and I would not have liked to have met him.

    Interesting/Notable 

    Pope Leo XIV carries Eucharist in procession—loved these photos!

    First of all, did you know it is only a one mile walk from St. John Lateran to St. Mary Major? Remember we stayed in a hotel very near to St. Mary Major when we were there in 2019. I would have guessed it was much farther from St. Mary Major to St. John Lateran.

    An Action Item: Proper Push-Up Form

    G sent me a video that I couldn’t find for the longest time, (update: found it here) about doing proper push-ups, and why it is really important for general health. The video creator said that you can start with wall push-ups, and progress. I enjoyed her gradual approach (as well as her line at the end: “It’s fun to be strong!”)

    Anyway, I’m going to challenge myself to do this. I think I can move directly to the counter push-ups, and I will try to do one set of 10 every day. (I’ll work up to the three sets of 10!). Give it a try!

  • Better Than Corn and New Wine

    Better Than Corn and New Wine

    The Mom Weekly Volume 97: June 17, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Better Than Corn and New Wine

    I couldn’t resist adding candy corn in this image.

    The other night when we were saying night prayer together, a line from Psalm 4 jumped out at me:

    You have put into my heart a greater joy than they have from abundance of corn and new wine.”

    I said afterwards, “hey, the line about better than corn or new wine made me think about a corn pasta recipe.”

    It’s this recipe—not pasta made from corn, but pasta with a creamy corn sauce. It sounds really good, and I’d like to make it someday soon.

    For some reason, the way I said it gave everyone a laugh at the time. And so it has become a running joke at our house. Someone says that he or she likes something, and another will say, “But is it better than corn or new wine?”

    I do really love corn, and I don’t really like wine much anymore, since it wrecks my sleep. So it’s not literally about something being better than an abundance of corn and new wine. 

    But there’s something not just funny, but also appropriate, about realizing that we can and should be grateful for all the good that we have, and how all those good things are a gift from God, who wants to give us good things.

    As we all know well, I am not the theologian in the family, so I may interpret the psalm incorrectly (not the first time that has happened, surely!). But it seems to me that the Psalm is a thanksgiving for the gift of faith, and for our relationship with the Lord and one another. Let’s look at the last few lines of the psalm:

    “What can bring us happiness?” many say.

    Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord.

    You have put into my heart a great joy

    Than they have from abundance of corn and new wine.

    I will lie down in peace and sleep comes at once

    For you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety.

    One humorous aside: Dad said once that the last line reminds him of me, since I have “the gift of sleep” and often can fall asleep when my head hits the pillow. Guilty as charged!

    Remember how much I love you,

    Mom

    Interesting/Notable: Father’s Day Edition

    First of all, I need to apologize to my brother and brothers-in-law, but I’m kind of embarrassed to. So, I’m doing it here. That’s because I completely blanked on sending Father’s Day cards to any of them, even though everyone knows that sending birthday and greeting cards is one of my love languages.

    Travel will be my excuse this year! So shared here are two excellent reads on the theme of Father’s Day:

    The Subtle Art of the Dad Text (NY Times Gift article)

    Stop Striving and Have a Baby (The Free Press)

    An Action Item: Consider Praying Night Prayer

    Having a regular prayer practice together, even if we don’t do it every night, is something wonderful. And so I want to encourage those who aren’t in our nuclear family to consider beginning to pray Night Prayer.

    The easiest and best way to do that is to subscribe to the Universalis app.

    You “can” do it free on the Universalis browser. Here is the link for the page for Night Prayer/Compline,

    Honestly? the Universalis app has been the most used app on my phone over the years, and easily the best value. I think we purchased it back when we used it on iPods? Or even Palm Pilots? I can’t even remember now, it’s been so long. The app offers all the hours of the Liturgy of the Hours—from Morning Prayer to the Office of Readings, Mass readings, and of course Night Prayer/Compline, and more.

    The one-time price for Universalis is about $25, which is a steal! Here’s the link for that.

  • Not Far From the Kingdom of God (From the Vault, May 2012)

    The Mom Weekly Volume 96: June 10, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Notes:

    As you will see, this weekly is connected with last week’s From the Vault. It is an appreciation of Maurice Sendak after he died in 2012 that I wrote for my Catholic book review site. That’s why the “voice” of this sounds slightly different than the usual.

    Not Far From the Kingdom of God (From the Vault, May 2012)

    Rest in peace, Maurice Sendak.

    Our family has a long association with Maurice Sendak, children’s book author and illustrator. In my childhood, our family had a copy of Where the Wild Things Are. I especially loved Max’s room and how his supper was warm in it. We weren’t ever allowed to eat in our bedrooms.  

    To the young me, it seemed fantastic and wonderful that Max could have supper in his room, especially after such misbehavior and such an adventure (even in his dreams).

    When my husband and I were first married and he had convinced me that a puppy was a good idea, the first book we read together about it was The Art of Raising Your Puppy by the Monks of New Skete, an order of Orthodox brothers who train dogs as their charism. For some reason, it was comforting that Maurice Sendak had his dogs trained personally with the Monks, as they discuss in the books.

    .And when children came to our house, Where the Wild Things Are was a perennial favorite at bedtime. In particular, after a bad day, it was one of the very reliable soothing books, along with Goodnight Moon and really anything by Margaret Wise Brown. Knowing that your supper would be waiting for you after adventures, that mom and dad will love you no matter how “wild” you are. It’s just a perfect book.

    With every one of our children, whenever I got to the line, “and Max wanted to be where someone loved him best of all…”  each one of our children would blurt out, “with his mommy and his daddy” as if it were in actually written in the text, and so for that book, for us, it is.

    When I kept a personal blog many years ago, I had pseudonyms for my children, and our son’s name was “Max.” Now you know why.

    Where The Wild Things Are is like a kids’ version of the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Read it again with that in mind, and I think you will agree.

    We have never seen the movie that was made several years back. None of us really wanted to, even though the promotions were quite appealing. I just don’t know how you can improve upon or make a full-length movie about a perfect picture book. It’s like making a movie about The Runaway Bunny. How can it possibly be any good?

    Maurice Sendak illustrated, but did not write, the Little Bear books (writing was by Else Holmelund Minarik) , and I saw an interview with Sendak once in which he mentioned how important it was for him to get the mother illustrated “just so.”

    The illustrations are what “make” the Little Bear series, If you’ve read them, notice how the picture that Little Bear drew in the story, A Kiss for Little Bear is a primitive Wild-Thing like monster.

    The Little Bear books were also popular young-age books at our house. Our oldest had “Birthday Soup” memorized at 3 years old–there’s a video of that somewhere. We also know large parts of most of the rest of the Little Bear books. I have especially fond memories of illustrations in The Goblin Story and Little Bear is Not Sleepy and oh, most of the others. So I’m going to stop now.

    Sendak had a book come out in the last year, but it was not well-reviewed.  I didn’t like all of Sendak’s work, so it wouldn’t surprise me if this one isn’t great.  Where the Wild Things Are and Little Bear are enough to make him well-loved at our house.

    UPDATE:

    Earlier today, I was driving into town to meet my husband for noon Mass, and I listened to a part of the NPR show “Fresh Air” where today, the show replayed several previous interviews host Terry Gross did with Sendak in recent years. [As a total aside, can I say that she is an AMAZING interviewer when not constrained by the age of celebrity and uber-scripted interviews. Sadly, most of the time interviews are just that, celebrity and scripted interviews].

    She asked Sendak at one point about his lack of faith (Sendak had been raised Jewish), and said she thought his unbelief seemed to grow stronger instead of being tested. He said something along the lines of (I’m paraphrasing here) “oh, yes, absolutely, I don’t think there is anything after death, which is why it’s so sad when my friends die.”

    And yet he said he did not fear death, and did not mind getting old as it allowed him time to read books and listen to great music. But then he said, a choke in his voice, “I believe I will see my brother again.”

    From the “Fresh Air” page with the entire interview, well worth a listen:

    “I have nothing now but praise for my life. I’m not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can’t stop them. They leave me and I love them more. … What I dread is the isolation. … There are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready.”

    After listening to this, and hearing his search for the good and beautiful, I can only to pray for him in the fond hope that he is re-united with his brother, where are all united perfectly.

    I need to start a post called  “not far from the Kingdom of God.” (From Mark 12: 28-32). I consider Maurice Sendak in that category, along with Steve Jobs. All these Emeths (from C.S. Lewis’ The Last Battle )who “all find what they truly seek.”

    Interesting/Notable

    Measuring Worth

    This website is cool for numbers nerds. The tag line says it all, “Measuring Worth is a service for calculating relative worth over time.”

    Here is one of the calculators, or “comparators.” It shows the purchase price or amount today of a purchase or salary in the past. 

    For instance, I could enter “$3.10” which was the minimum wage when I was in high school. Today, that amount would be $12.58/hour today. The current federal minimum wage is $7.25, though many states have a higher minimum wage. Illinois, for instance, has a minimum wage of $15/hour.

    Using this comparator for measuring Great British pounds to US dollars over a period of years, I could look up how much Mr. Darcy’s “ten thousand a year” would be.

    That 10,000 in pounds works out to an annual income of $1.3 million dollars in 2023, the most current data available. That’s quite a yearly amount! It would be a lot as a lump sum. No wonder he and Mr. Bingley (with his “four or five thousand a year”, or probably $650,000, year after year) were sought-after marriage partners. 

  • Good Movies, Bad Movies (From the Vault, October 2009)

    Good Movies, Bad Movies (From the Vault, October 2009)

    The Mom Weekly Volume 95: June 3, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Notes:

    I am queuing up several “From the Vault” selections due to travel going on right now!!!

    I actually teared up reading this post, and remembering all the wonderful books we have read together over the years. I wonder if you kids remember some of our family traditions around picture books.

    Also: there’s a new occasional feature here called “Mini Book Review” that can sometimes replace the “Interesting/Notable” section. Sometimes I enjoy reading a book so much that I want to share as many takeaways as possible from it.

    Good Movies, Bad Movies (From the Vault, October 2009)

    I am pretty careful about our movie and tv watching. l consider the DVR great for letting us fast forward through the commercials of any given show, both for time-saving and for getting past icky things. I try to get good recommendations from like-minded friends, and also look around for good sources of unusual media, whether books, movies, shows.

    We especially love Netflix for letting our family watch more obscure or foreign films. Netflix suggests films you would like based on films you’ve rated. We’ve watched so many really interesting, and slow moving, foreign films to see a slice of life in other cultures. So when Netflix suggested The Color of Paradise, because we liked Children of Heaven and some other films, I added it to the queue. It was in our house for quite awhile because we haven’t found the time to watch it.

    The Netflix description sounded good: “Awash in the sights and sounds of an Iranian summer, this moving family drama stars Mohsen Ramezani as Mohammed, an 8-year-old blind boy whose poor widower father (Hossein Mahjoub) nearly abandons him at a school for blind children. Welcomed home by his grandmother and sisters, the bright boy is eager to immerse himself in the world of the seeing — but his father fears Mohammed may hinder his attempts to remarry into a prosperous family.”

    I got the chance to preview the first 45 minutes or so, and it was again very sweet and a little poignant. I thought, fine, so one Saturday afternoon I put it on for the kids, and I was sort of half-watching with them as I was going through some files. I’m thinking to myself, “Now, couldn’t I just have taken 30 seconds to read theWikipedia entry?” This was NOT a film for our family. Ideagirl turned to me at one point when things started going downhill (I think when the Grandmother died) and said firmly, “You did watch this first, didn’t you? DIDN’T YOU?”

    We did watch it to the bitter end just because even Wikipedia made it sound hopeful, and I tried to discuss it that way, but I was assured by several of my children they would have bad dreams about it. That didn’t happen because we worked hard to completely forget about it. But I’m still feeling guilty!

    I still do feel a bit guilty that I hadn’t done my homework more. I am usually pretty good about that, but I also know that we can all survive a bad media choice and move on. The next in our Netflix queue? A movie we saw a scene of walking through Sam’s Club several weeks back and the kids said, “That looks funny!” So we got it.

    What fantastic and creative film did we get and watch and enjoy as a lark? Beverly Hills Chihuahua. Fortunately here, I was able to read the Plugged In online review and know the whole story, any objectionable elements, and let the kids enjoy without worrying. I will say I’m glad we don’t see every random movie that comes out, because for a day or so the kids were singing the song at the end of the movie, and it is now going through my head, “la, la, la, la, la, Chihuahua….”

    So good movies, bad movies, cheesy Hollywood movies—all have a place, I guess.

    Also on the topic of movies, I am still debating whether we should go see Where the Wild Things Are. I know it is getting great critical reviews, and it looks gorgeous in its cinematography, but I just don’t know.

    I consider Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are, the children’s book on which the movie is based, a perfect book. Absolutely, 100 percent perfect. Max is named after the character in that book (here, not IRL, but still). I have read that book so many times I can recite it. It’s such a Prodigal Son story, I tear up almost every time I read it.

    Each of my children, unprompted, has added in “with his mommy and his daddy” when we read the line, “And Max ….wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.”

    This book is just magical at our house, like Margaret Wise Brown’s The Important Book and The Runaway Bunny, and Virginia Lee Burton’s Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel and P.D. Eastman’s Are You My Mother?

    Ideagirl always demanded, truly demanded, from the time she was small, that the child characters in Runaway Bunny and Are You My Mother? be girls, so much so that I have to consciously remember to read the real words when Max and I read them together. Right now many other books are popping into my head. This would be a fun list to make.

    So the idea of a movie, supplanting in some way the book by being bigger and more intense (as movies inevitably are), and different, as this one must be, because a movie based on the actual book Where the Wild Things Are would last about 2 minutes. I know that I could preview it first, and then take the kids, as Sir and I did with the first Narnia film, but I don’t even know if I want my imagination of the book replaced by a movie. So I’m still wondering.

    Mini Book Review: Custodians of Wonder by Eliot Stein

    Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions and the Last People Keeping Them Alive by Eliot Stein

    Stein is an editor at BBC Travel, and writes a column there called “Custom Made.” Each chapter of “Custodians of Wonder” profiles a person or persons who is maintaining an old, or even ancient, tradition, and keeping alive a special tradition unique to that culture.

    For instance, the chapter titled “Where Bees are Part of the Family” is all about the centuries old tradition of “telling the bees” when family events like weddings or deaths happened. Stein finds it is still going on in England to this day.

    I first learned about this charming tradition when we watched “Lark Rise to Candleford” the British costume show set in 19th century rural life. In one episode, the old lady Queenie thought her husband was dead, and she went outside to her beehives to “tell the bees” that he was dead. It turns out he wasn’t, so it was a comic moment, but still.

    Another chapter is “The Most Romantic Job in Europe,” and here Stein profiles a retired postal worker who was the longest-serving delivery driver to a tree in a German forest that has become a way for people to seek and find love.

    If you’re interested, Stein had previously written a Custom Made article with the same subject; it’s been adapted and expanded in the book.

    What I like best about the book is that Stein writes carefully about the history of each tradition in a thorough and respectful way. 

    The very last words of the book, at the end of the acknowledgments, are a good sum what Stein was trying to achieve. He writes to his infant son, (to whom he dedicated the book, along with his wife.)

    And to Oliver, you may not read this book for many years, but if you ever do, I hope it reminds you that the world can be a wondrous place, and that one of the greatest uses of life is to spend it on something that may outlast it.

  • My Circus, My Monkeys (Part the Second)

    My Circus, My Monkeys (Part the Second)

    The Mom Weekly Volume 94: May 27, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Notes:

    In case you missed last week, this is Part 2 of “My Monkeys, My Circus” and I hope it makes sense. I don’t want you to get the impression that I equate having dogs with children, because I’m Team Baby, but it still was funny when it happened, and I hope you’ll enjoy it too.

    Also today, May 27, is St. Augustine of Canterbury. Remember reading “Augustine Came to Kent” together many years ago?

    And then a year or two after that, we ourselves were in Kent? I love the photo of you three sitting on the ground in three arched alcoves at Canterbury Cathedral.

    My Monkeys, My Circus (Part the Second)

    Recently I got a very well meaning and nicely worded text from a neighbor. I’m going to excerpt it here: 

     Please don’t take this message the wrong way.  Your dogs really don’t bother us …   I just wanted to share a solution for dog barking. Our new little dog was starting to bark at people walking by on the sidewalk so I got this bark collar and it worked amazing. Check it out.”

    And there was a link to a bark collar, which I think shocks the dog so that they don’t bark at all.

    For context, this was on Dad’s birthday, and I was in the middle of making the complicated entremets desserts that I was inspired to make from our watching of the Great British Bake-Off. Not only has the show gotten me into baking more complicated things, but it is such a soothing, enjoyable watch.

    Here was my response:

    (Neighbor), thank you so much! I am not offended at all. I appreciate the details, and I appreciate you as our neighbor. I don’t have bandwidth to look at this right now, as Joseph’s (husband) birthday is tomorrow and I’m in the midst of making a very complicated dessert! But I will look at this soon.

    And that’s the end of that interaction. God bless entremets for saving me from having to craft something more.

    Anyway, by the time I got to read it, I started laughing again. 

    My first thought? my monkeys, my circus. 

    You may have posited that I have zero desire to shock our dogs with bark collars. Again, this works for them and their dogs, but I cannot imagine it, and it would make at least one of our dogs so much more dramatic than he already is.

    For context: we are in the process of installing fencing that helps the dogs not see the neighbors so that they don’t bark too much. 

    And if our dogs were barking incessantly, or we kept them out at all hours of the day and night, and they barked at everything, it would be helpful to offer me ideas. But this is truly a “my monkeys, my circus” type of situation. We use our prudential judgment to manage our lives in the way we think best.

    I also feel the need to clarify that there are some things that should be brought to the attention of people. To refer back to last week, I can’t imagine a scenario in which I would actually talk to someone about their kids’ behavior at Mass. However, I might try to get to know the family, and even ask if I could help in any way, or take the offending kid out to walk around when they got busy. 

    As far as animals go:

     1. I did think the neighbor worded the request very kindly and carefully, and he meant it in good faith. But I don’t feel the least bit of curiosity about exploring the option, as I am 100 percent sure it would send me over the edge.

    Also:

     2. There are contexts in which it is a good idea to share kindly about asking people to change their behavior. In fact, I did just that, in a post in our neighborhood FB group during the pandemic about people not cleaning up after their dogs. I was really proud of this, because usually people would post something like, “Disgusting! All of you people who let your dogs do your business and not pick it up are the worst humans ever! Sad we live in such a world.”

    So I am going to share it here, and I hope you’ll agree with me. Coincidence or not, I see much less dog poop left behind when I am out and about.

     And let’s all remember that we can carefully and respectfully try to get people to see something differently. And I guess, also accept that they might not agree!

    March 2021

    Hello neighbors! I thought about putting this here when it happened to me some months back, but I hesitated as I didn’t want to be a Gladys Kravitz about it (all you younger neighbors can just google it and you’ll see what I’m talking about, LOL).

    But the last few months have helped draw us together as a neighborhood and get to know each other better. So just like I’d feel awkward but okay talking to a friend about this, I feel ready to be awkward here with all of you.

    It’s dog poop.

    Please, if you have a dog or dogs, be kind and neighborly and pick up their poop when you walk them in the neighborhood.

    What prompts my note: this morning, I stepped in some dog poop on the street during my early morning walk/run. It happens to me once every few months, though I see it a lot more than that and I’m able to sidestep it. It can be really annoying, and it’s hard to get off of running shoes!

    True confession: when we had our first dog—over 25 years ago—I actually did not understand that picking up poop was a thing. And I cringe now to think about all the places where we left poop in people’s yards, and on the street of the town where we lived. In my defense, I did not grow up with a dog and so did not know this basic etiquette. I just didn’t give it a thought. Some neighbors may also not be aware of this common practice, or grew up in the country where it isn’t done or isn’t common.

    I know better now (and did back then, after a short time of having a dog). That’s why I always have dog bags with me to collect poop when we take our dogs on walks.

    I’ve learned a couple of things. I know some of these are goofy and you’re probably thinking, duh, but bear with me:

    Dog bags are very inexpensive. I used to (and still do) save grocery bags for this purpose, but we’d have to inspect them to make sure they had no holes, etc. But a couple of years ago, I ordered some from our chewy.com Autoship and I realized it costs pennies to have ready-to-go bags for walks.

    I keep a poop bag tied to the dogs’ leads, so that if I forget to grab one, there is always one with whoever is walking the dog or dogs.

    I appreciate all neighbors listening with understanding and considering following this practice. Have a great day.

    Interesting/Notable

    The Spy Trick to Joining Any Conversation (Even if You’re Anxious)

    This is very useful information!

  • My Monkeys, My Circus (Part the First)

    My Monkeys, My Circus (Part the First)

    The Mom Weekly Volume 93: May 20, 2025

    You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

    Notes:

    As I was crafting this, it turned into a much longer reflection than I expected. And so I decided to break this up into two parts. It’s not a cliff-hanger, not really, but it lends itself to two categories. It will make sense next week, I promise!

    Remember how much I love you, 

    Mom 

    My Monkeys, My Circus (Part the First)

    When I was trying to look up the expression, “not my circus, not my monkeys,” I found

    1. That it’s an old Polish proverb. It basically is a way for people to say, “I’m not going to engage with whatever drama is being presented to me.”

    2. Then I found this recent WSJ opinion piece about how detachment from others is a good skill, and I wholeheartedly agree. It’s important to disengage from the drama of others when necessary, for our own well-being and health. 

    Not My Circus, Not My Monkeys: How I’ve Learned to Deal with the Addicts in My Life

    However, that’s not what I’m talking about here.

    You kids know that I got two anonymous letters — actual US postal service mail—when you were tiny and little, from a parish member in our old town? They were badly worded and mean missives instructing me to keep better control of my kids at Mass. That would be you! 

    I am actually laughing about this now as I write, because I’m so beyond this. 

    But for a long time, I was tender about it. And I actually saved the letters for years; can you believe it? Until one day I was going through a folder of stuff and found them, and thought, why am I saving these? I should only save good positive letters and mementos. So into the trash they went.

    The other funny story about this is that when I received the first one, a dear friend and I — who both often attended daily Mass with our kids—were trying to speculate about who could have sent such a letter. And we hit upon the idea of a cranky old lady who wore housecoats and went to daily Mass. I have blessedly forgotten her name, but was something old-fashioned like “Mabel Smith.” And then she died, and I got the second letter, and I thought, “I’m so sorry for thinking bad things about you, Mabel Smith.” LOL.

    Because of that experience, I have always been extremely supportive of families at Mass. I go out of my way to talk to families whose kids have been “busy” (which sometimes can be a euphemism for being dreadful) to say that they are doing great to bring them to Mass, and it’s okay to walk in and out of the church as needed, and to do what you need to.

    Sometimes, as you have experienced, I will point out one of you adult children and say how “busy” you were, and how even though I don’t feel like I got a lot out of  Mass then, “NOW” you are the ones “shush-ing” me if I whisper something. It’s kind of hilarious.

    Dad, God bless him, who is usually pretty easygoing about things, was always extremely firm that we would not punish kids for kid-like behavior at Mass. Not that I ever wanted to! 

    But the way he talked about never wanting you to feel shame or bad feelings related to religious things, still brings me to tears, because it makes so much spiritual sense.

    Anyway, there’s also the expression “two things can be true at the same time.” Back the, when talking about some of these things to friends, a few had the opinion that maybe I did need to crack down a little more, or find a way to make you behave. (Again, I’m laughing—you kids are all so strong willed—how could I get you to do anything?). 

    They would tell stories of how they got their kids to “behave” at Mass, and they were things Dad and I would never do. Now, some of those people I still know, and their now adult children still seem to have an active faith life, even experiencing what I consider harsh punishment when they were young. So every family is different, and lots of different approaches work.  

    Now that I am older, I see there are a lot of ways to successfully raise kids, and it’s important to do what works best for your personality, and try to be open to the Holy Spirit nudges for changes or the right thing to say. My circus, my monkeys.

    That is a VERY long introduction to what happened to me earlier this month. But I am going to save that for next week.

    Interesting/Notable:

    First “math pope” reveals unity of faith and reason

    Meet the “Stealthy Wealthy” Who Make Their Money the Boring Way

    An Action Item: Start Your Summer List

    (I’ve posted this in the past, and usually much earlier than this. But it’s still good idea!)

    Summer is fast approaching, and it’s time to think ahead about things that you would like to “accomplish” or do. And you can be creative! I haven’t even started mine, but I’m going to use this as a kind of template to begin:

    *restaurant to visit (either that you’ve never done so, or not in a long time)

    *nearby town to explore 

    *hiking trail to re-hike

    *new trail to hike 

    *savory summer recipe to try

    *sweet summer recipe to try

    *a goal to visit the farmer’s market monthly or more often; a different one each time?

    *museum to visit, especially with an intriguing temporary exhibit