The gratitude journal

Negativity slithered through our front door this fall, bringing darkness with it. We didn’t see it coming, of course, because that’s how it works.

But one day in late October, the dreariness captured my attention. How long had it been this dusky inside the house? I could hardly see the truth anymore for all the shadows.

“Not this again,” I said to no one in particular.

But I wasn’t the only one letting negativity’s gloom into our living quarters. Other family members had opened the door for it too. And we all seemed to entertain it most during our mealtimes together, venting our frustrations and irritations until the light over the table was as dim as a Minnesota morning in the fall before going off daylight savings time.

We were justified in our complaints, though, weren’t we? We were only discussing what was happening, right? There wasn’t any harm in it, was there? Facts were facts. And we could all agree there were too many hoops for Flicka to hop through in college, too many unanswered questions about Ricka’s life post-high school, too many worries about volleyball club teams for Dicka, too many schedule changes for Husband at work, and too many demands layered into my own days.

While the discussions stimulated me at first, negativity soon sucked away my energy.

Finally, I was done with it. So I resurrected an ancient solution for me—and for the family.

Gratitude.

“Here’s what’s happening,” I said one night at dinner, plunking down an old spiral notebook and pen. “We’re going to start a gratitude journal. It’ll stay right here on the table. Add to it whenever you think of something.”

I acted as scribe that first time, pointing my pen at each family member in the circle, forcing answers out of the whole lot of them until each had said something—anything.

At first, our gratefulness was staid: friends, family, volleyball, the dog. But as the days went, it broke free: Life Cereal, Dad telling his own embarrassing stories to comfort us, Dicka’s quick metabolism, God’s concept of time and money, when that car didn’t crash into Ricka in Uptown, candles, ChapStick, Flicka’s fast-growing hair, bagels, snow tires, the sun…

The concept of gratitude has existed since darkness was separated from light, and a person documenting his or her thankfulness has been around for eons too. Even so, I shared my not-so-creative-but-fresh-to-me idea of a gratitude journal with some loved ones.

Several had already tapped into the power of putting it on paper.

“It’s a life changer,” my sister said.

“It’s a game changer,” my friend said.

“It changes everything,” my neighbor said.

Hmm. So much change.

A week later, Ricka entered the house from school, her cell phone in hand. She tapped on it. “Mom, I took notes today about things I’m thankful for. Wanna hear them?”

She rattled off her list to me, and I transcribed the items into the gratitude journal. Taking a closer look, I noticed others had been in our notebook too—others beyond our family—scratching down their own notes of gratefulness.

That night at dinner, the dining room table looked different. Something had changed. I could see the food better—and my family too.

Was it just me, or was it brighter in here?

*Question for you, reader: If you started a gratitude journal today, what things/people/etc. would make your top ten?

 *Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Business review: Vintage Nail & Spa

My girl Dicka and I climb the stairs inside the historic building on the corner of 42nd Avenue North and Lyndale in North Minneapolis. We want to be called regulars at this neighborhood nail salon, and since this is our second visit, we decide we’re well on our way.

Today, access to Vintage Nail & Spa is easy. But last summer, the messy roads forced us to park several blocks away and cross 42nd Avenue on foot. Road construction plunged the appearance of the street back to the 1800s, and we gingerly lifted our long skirts and crossed the abandoned dirt road on foot like two proper ladies heading into the mercantile to sell our baskets of eggs.

(We weren’t really wearing long skirts.)

Today, we enter the nail salon, situated on the second floor in what was once an old ballroom. Teng, the owner, calls to us from across the expansive space. She’s with another customer, she says, but she’ll soon take care of us. I smile, remembering her friendly face. And just like last time, her eyes sparkle like she’s thinking of a joke but now isn’t the right time to tell it.

One of Teng’s employees, an older gentleman, guides us to side-by-side massage chairs and stirs something blue and fizzy into the water of our foot baths. Dicka and I settle in, dipping our feet into the warmth.

The chair kneads my back. I draw a deep breath and release it, letting my eyes flutter shut.

My phone rings. I fish it out of my purse. My friend Trixie.

“Are you guys okay?” she says, a little winded, her voice edged with worry.

“Yeah. Why?” I meet Dicka’s frown with one of my own, plus a shrug. “What’s up?”

“Well, the multiple shootings that happened right now by you.” When I say this is news to me, she tells me the cross streets of the incident and that her husband Todd has been trying to reach Husband with no success. “Todd says one of the houses on the news looks like yours.”

“That’s four blocks from our place.” I say it like it’s a planet away—maybe even a galaxy away—from us.

“Oh. At least you’re okay.” I hear the relief in her tone, and she exhales.

Our call finished, I focus on the leg scrub.

My phone pings. Aunt F.

I open her message: I just need to know you’re okay. Saw breaking news on KARE11 that there was a shooting a few blocks from you and several (maybe five men) are in the hospital. Give me a sign, please.

I tap out a response, putting Aunt F at ease.

The man sands away at my heels. The previous minutes melt away, and I wonder why news of shootings hits me with the same urgency as I feel when I listen to the weather report.

(I file away an idea for a future blog post, because this one is a nail salon review.)

Tia, the resident massage therapist, is helping with pedicures today. She finishes Dicka’s foot treatment, and the man at my feet leaves his stool so Teng can take over. She inspects his work, then swipes the base, nail color, and top coats onto my toenails. Next is Dicka’s turn.

Afterward, we move over to the manicure area, and Teng does her magic.

Tia wanders to a table laden with crock-pots and dishes on the far side of the salon. She lifts one of the lids, a delicious aroma wafts out, and now I’m hungry. She fills a bowl with something from one of the crock-pots, then slurps up a spoonful of the steaming substance.

“What is this?” She’s choking a little. “This orange stuff?”

Teng shakes her head and smiles. “‘Orange stuff.’”

“I mean, are there ghost peppers in here, or what?”

“No, no.” Teng laughs. “Nothing like that.”

Tia takes another taste and coughs. “I can’t do this.” Her face pink, she rushes her bowl toward a back room and disappears.

Teng chuckles again and brushes a coat of polish on Dicka’s nails while I sit under a dryer for three minutes. I think I want to be friends with Teng. I also think about the food Tia attempted to eat, and my stomach rumbles.

“Where are you from?” I say, trying to ignore my desire to sample the ‘orange stuff’ too. 

“Laos,” Teng says.

I mean to ask her what her crock-pots hold, but we talk about business on the Northside instead. It’s nearing eight o’clock now—almost closing time—and hip-hop blasts from the downstairs business, rattling Teng’s salon.

She grins. “Every night after they close up, they have a party down there.”

A party. Feels like a party up here too, but it has nothing to do with the music.

Happy with our nails, I pay, accruing more holes in our punch cards. If we prioritize the condition of our nails over the next year, we could fill our cards fast. And have more time to hang out with Teng.

Because manicures and pedicures at Vintage Nail & Spa are so much more than getting your nails done.

Notes about the salon:

• A regular manicure is $15.00; a regular pedicure $25.00.

• A mani/pedi combo is $35.00, but on Tuesdays and Wednesdays it’s on special for $30.00.

• Don’t forget your punch card!

• If you chip a nail within 3 days of your manicure or pedicure, Teng will repair it for free.

 Vintage Nail & Spa, www.vintagenailandspa.com, 705 42nd Ave. N., Minneapolis, MN  55412, 651-387-8022

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Still the same

My kid (in the story below) has grown by two years and moved on to high school, but what matters most is unchanged.

Enjoy this post from November 10, 2016.

*****

Wednesday morning, my alarm clock jolted me out of bed at the usual time. The coffeemaker brewed my customary dark roast, and with the normal splash of cream, my coffee tasted the same too.

Like I do every weekday, I walked Dicka to the bus stop at the end of the block. And again, the fallen leaves and garbage fluttered by our feet as we strode down the sidewalk together. I side-stepped the trash and sighed; it seemed the identical litter appeared every morning, even though I picked it up daily on the way back to the house.

But something about the day was different.

“I don’t want to go to school,” Dicka said.

I assessed her face. No red, drippy nose. No glassy eyes. “Why not?”

“Because everyone will be talking about the election.” She tugged her hood forward to cover her ears. “I just want it to be over.”

I curled my arm around her. “I hear you.”

At the corner, we waited for the school bus. The sixth grade girl from across the street plodded toward us like she always did. And as usual, an invisible weight—bigger than her backpack—pulled her shoulders down. My heart pinched, and I greeted her. She said hi back and then patted her mouth as she yawned, keeping an eye on me the whole time.

I accepted her non-verbal invitation. “So, you’re pretty tired today?”

“I watched the election last night,” she said. “I got to stay up until it was over.”

“Wow. That was late. I was asleep by ten-thirty.”

Her posture straightened, and her eyes sparked. “Did you hear Trump won?”

“I did.”

“He’ll be impeached soon. Like Nixon.”

I imagined the conversation swirling around her TV the night before as states on the screen lit up in red or blue. What else had the adults in her house told her to make the world right for her—and for them?

The bus pulled up and the door screeched open. I kissed Dicka on the forehead and said goodbye to the neighbor girl. The two of them climbed the steps and were gone.

I walked back to the house, plucking the garbage along my path. This morning, the citizens of the country dressed in new clothes: elation, hope, shock, fear, anger. Groups had decided to protest, and others had threatened to unleash riots throughout the nation on neighborhoods like ours. But our street was quiet at eight o’clock in the morning, and the message for me and my family again reverberated off the pavement and houses that lined our block. In our changing times, our calling stayed the same.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And love your neighbor as yourself.

If the national debt rose or fell, if immigrants were ousted or welcomed, if discrimination stamped out love like some feared or acceptance for all became the rule, nothing would change for us. We’d still talk to the girl at the bus stop, remove snow in the winter for the neighbors, take in kids in crisis, pick up the garbage. We’d still notice the invisible ones living among us, respond to the needs that were delivered to our door, and say no to the deeds that were good but not meant for us.

And we’d stay rooted in the One who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The compliment

A woman knows she’s at home in her neighborhood when she ventures out without first checking a mirror. The to-do list is more demanding than one’s reflection sometimes, and that’s how it was for me some years ago on that October day. 

One-hundred people had RSVPed yes to our home that night. We had kept up our fall party for over a decade under the event title, “The Somewhat Annual Rib & Wing Ordeal,” the somewhat our coverage for the years we couldn’t get our acts together to entertain the masses.

Late in the afternoon, I stopped in to the convenience store one block from our house. We needed twenty pounds of ice, so I dragged two ten-pound bags from the store’s standing freezer and boosted them up on my hips like two cold babies. Why was the place so busy? Two lines of people snaked back from the front counter, and two of the store’s four Muhammads manned the cash registers.

I scurried into Muhammad #2’s line. How long would this take? Only one hour until go time and I still needed a shower. I waited my turn, assessing the rack of cell phone accessories near me. Not a bad price for phone chargers. It never hurt to have an extra, but maybe the quality of these—

“Ma’am? Ma’am?” A man’s voice jerked me back to the moment, and I shot a look around for anyone else who might fall into the “ma’am” category. Only two of us in a whole slew of men.

“Ma’am?” Muhammad #1 said it again, pinning me with his gaze.

“Oh, me?” I said, my eyebrows jumping. Several customers shot looks my way.

The man pointed at a teenage kid at the front of his line. “This young man is telling you you’re a beautiful woman.”

The boy grinned at me. Wait. What? He had been trying to get my attention? All business paused for a second, other eyes trained on me now. I bested the kid in age by at least thirty years. What was I wearing again? I glanced down. Oh yeah. Ratty yoga pants, stained t-shirt, flip-flops, dirty hair in a ponytail, no makeup.

“Wow,” I called over to the kid. “You just made my day.”

The teenager bobbed his head, his smile stretching wider. He finished his transaction and ducked out of the store.

I bit into my upper lip to hold back a laugh.

The previous week I had bemoaned the years that were telling a new story on my face all of a sudden, and the skin above my kneecaps that had decided to be lazy now. But a compliment from a kid buying snacks—and Muhammad who acted like it was the most natural thing in the world to relay that compliment across a busy store—changed my day.  

Gravity and the years coming at us are unavoidable, but if some young pup in a convenience store thinks an older lady in her unwashed state’s got it goin’ on, who am I to judge?

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Even more of yesterday's books

Two weeks ago, I invited you, my readers, to share your favorite books from childhood. Here is the final installment of your reading memories:

*****

Before I could devour books on my own, the earliest stories I remember were read to me by my mother, so the pictures carried the story for me. I memorized the artwork in Bible stories and in stories like Heidi by Johanna Spyri. Even today, the mental picture of the young Heidi sleepwalking, wearing a long white nightgown, brings me back to the story—an orphan girl who when living in the city became homesick for her grandpa and the mountains. Looking back now, I think this story probably gripped me because of the conflicts of the memorable characters, so unlike my own life as a preschooler.

Avis, Newfolden, Minnesota

*****

The earliest ones I can remember - from when I was three or so, and some of which I still have in the attic! - were Cyril the Squirrel, Miss Sniff, and a wonderful Cinderella. But I think one of the books which impressed me when I was about thirteen was The Diary of Anne Frank. I can actually see myself in my room reading this book and being so moved. As I teacher I also recommended books like Number the Stars and another favorite, The Devil’s Arithmetic, as important books about the Holocaust. I remember one my mother remembered from HER childhood, The Little Minister. And one of my all-time favorites - still, to this day - Alice in Wonderland! It is brilliant!

Sandy, Lacombe, Louisiana

*****

Nancy Drew mysteries! I think I read them all. An avid reader, I also snuck books from my mama’s bookcase. I read Jaws and The Exorcist when I was just 11 years old. Yeah, that was not my best idea. Be careful, Little Eyes, what you see…

Shelby, Crystal, Minnesota

*****

I suppose Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy by Henry Kissinger just cements my place in the warped corral. But I did read it when I was 10 years old. I went on to read Chemical and Biological Warfare by Seymour Hersh in 9th grade. The teacher wouldn’t take it as my book review until he quizzed me on the thing. I used to drive the librarians crazy at the bookmobile: I’d read every book and started on the college level stuff when I was in grade school. Thus, the me you get today.

Joe, Saint Paul, Minnesota

*****

I loved the book Snow Treasure written by Marie McSwiggen. The story was about Norwegian children who hid bars of gold on their sleds and took them down the mountain to the harbor to smuggle them out of the country right under the noses of Nazi soldiers. My parents and I all read the Little House books that I brought home from my elementary school library. In high school I worked at the public library which was a very uncool job, but it exposed me to many wonderful books.

Kathy, Maple Grove, Minnesota

*****

I liked the Maud Hart Lovelace books, Nancy Drew, Sweet Valley High and then I started reading trashy romance novels my aunts left at my grandparents’ house. I was a little young to be reading them for sure.

Micara, New Market, Minnesota

*****

Any book about a horse! Walter Farley’s “The Black Stallion” series, the C.W. Anderson “Billy and Blaze” series, anything by Marguerite Henry and Sam Savitt (beautiful illustrator too!), and pretty much every other book on the subject I could get my hands on.

I grew up in a small town, and your prompt brought back warm memories of the excitement that I felt when the bookmobile would come to town. I would hope and wish and pray that there would be a new horse book for me to check out!

Gina, Rochester, Minnesota

*****

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

More of yesterday's books

Last week, I asked you about your favorite books from childhood. Many of you responded, so we’ll enjoy two weeks of trips to the past together. Here are this week’s memories:

I don’t know if this counts as my favorite ‘book’ but I was obsessed with any and all things Nancy Drew.  I read every single hard cover published (sometimes twice) until they went to paperback. I loved the mysteries that involved her boyfriend (Ned) and her best girlfriends (Bess and George). She was the daughter of a busy single dad which I thought was cool at the time because she had a lot of ‘freedom’ to investigate all these mysteries.  Nancy had two major impacts on my life: 1) once I was able to learn to drive I didn’t know where I was going because I had my face in a book every time we got into the car and 2) Nancy, in partnership with Clarice Starling, was influential in my choice of my Criminal Justice college major.

Karyn, Mounds View, Minnesota

*****

Charlotte's Web: Simple but profound thoughts for everyday life as well as a glimpse into deeper more spiritual realms of our existence: “Why did you do all this for me?” he asked. “I don't deserve it. I've never done anything for you.” “You have been my friend,” replied Charlotte. “That in itself is a tremendous thing.”; “I wove my webs for you because I liked you. After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that.” I remember those quotes standing out to me even as a child. I'm quite sure I didn't I understand what it meant on a conscious level but I can say now that I'm sure it met and very possibly exposed my child's desire for love and friendship and a more peaceful world during that time in life. Ironically, it also sends the message that oftentimes there is a cost to it as well.

Peter, Maple Grove, Minnesota

*****

The Boxcar Children! I remember thinking they were living an exciting and adventurous life. I was extremely disappointed several years later to see the inside of a boxcar!

Sharon, Great Falls, Montana

*****

I loved all things Roald Dahl...especially his "Revolting Rhymes" which was given to me as a Christmas gift by my older (and therefore cooler) cousins in North Dakota, who really got my sardonic 9 year-old sense of humor. I spent hours in my bedroom memorizing his irreverent version of "Cinderella", and would perform it on command for anyone who'd get suckered into listening. I think I also performed in for a 4-H talent show. I'm pretty sure I can still recite it from start to finish... (Enjoy Roald Dahl’s “Cinderella” here.)

Carissa, Robbinsdale, Minnesota

*****

Readers Digest’s The World’s Best Fairy Tales from 1967. Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, Billy Beg and His Bull, Rumpelstiltskin, The Musicians of Bremen, Blue Beard, and The Princess on the Glass Hill were some of my favorites. Also, Louis L’amour, Jack London, and Mark Twain.

Scott, Minneapolis, Minnesota

*****

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Yesterday's books

“Reading never wears me out.” Olivia, by Ian Falconer

What book from childhood did you like best? And why?

Write me a note about your favorite book from when you were a kid (photos welcome too) and send it here. Subscribers, simply hit reply to this email. I will publish your reading memories (along with your first name and location) in next week’s blog installment.

I’ll get us started…

I dragged my finger along the tattered bindings of Maj Lindman’s books. Inside their pages frolicked triplet girls from another time and place. I tagged along with them on their adventures—with a little dog, a new friend, their new dotted dresses, the girl next door, and the three kittens. Their mother always wore high heels in the house. And did she really cook for them all day long? Was that what life was like in Sweden even before my own mother was alive? The girls’ names—Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka—plucked at something inside me. How fun to say! Maybe one day I’d have triplets of my own.

Now it’s your turn.

And until next time… “But the wild things cried, ‘Oh please don’t go—we’ll eat you up—we love you so!’” Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

All things new

The beauty of deterioration calls to me. It’s everywhere in the world’s architecture, but today Husband and I want to refresh our memories in our part of town. He presses the brakes, pulling the truck over in front of one of our favorites: the historic C.A. Smith Lumber Company on Lyndale Avenue North in Minneapolis. We climb out and stroll the grounds of “the castle building.” Years before it was a trend, Husband dreamed of living in an old warehouse. And he dreams of it still.

“Can you imagine having a bedroom up there?” He points at the turret of the Machine Specialties building with its arched windows.

“I could handle that.” And I think of writing in that circular room too, because nothing but elegance could emerge from a place like that.

We wander the connected property to the north, the Compo-Board Company, again. And I snap pictures this time too. In one spot, crumbling bricks jut out of the foundation like barnacles on a ship. Sheets of rusted, corrugated steel hang like curtains on part of the structure. And on all sides of the building, different colors, materials, and shapes harmonize. Here, like in humanity, diversity sings.

A pang of longing strikes me. The beauty I see in the disintegration, the dilapidation, the decomposition is fleeting. Why can’t it always be this way—even after this life? Eternity would be lovelier with this kind of decay, wouldn’t it?

Behold, I make all things new.

The faithful and true promise of heaven’s newness comforts me when injustice, racism, abuse, and hatred seem to be winning. Do away with mankind’s darkness, yes, but can’t the old architecture stay? The rough wood with its history? The rusted metals with their stories? The ancient bricks with their wisdom?

I only think these thoughts, though, because I’m still in my skin on this side of forever. And I know I can’t comprehend the beauty that’s coming.

No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him.

 *Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Doris

I first met Doris at a neighborhood block meeting in 2003. Nothing fancy, that meeting. Just a small gathering of people perched on folding chairs on the sidewalk in front of our neighbor Marta’s house. A guy named Don told us about some troublemakers messing with his garage, and he peppered the air with expletives. I shot a look at my girls—just two of them then, ages one and three—wondering if they caught the colorful language. Marta reined in the talk, funneling it in useful directions. And Doris floated above it all; she leaned into my double stroller, making funny faces at my babies until they laughed.

Doris worked in Mr. N’s yard in the summers, her face mottled from heat and hard work, sweat dripping off her chin. She bagged leaves in the fall and shoveled snow in the winter for him too. We exchanged waves and small talk whenever I spied her outside.

Then came the gifts. Doris dropped off little surprises for our girls on holidays. She worked at Litin Paper Company and snagged some good deals, she said. Each of the girls got orange pumpkin-shaped bags of goodies on Halloween, trinkets in Santa bags at Christmas, and little baskets of treasures for Easter. We’d come home from our out-of-town New Year’s festivities to jolly noise-makers and candy on our back step. And her fondness for Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka on Valentine’s Day came in the shape of hearts filled with chocolates—one for each girl.

Inspired by Doris, we decided to do some doorstep treats of our own for the neighbors. We began our Christmas cookie venture in 2004, the year Dicka was born. Just because people don’t normally deliver homemade cookies to strangers in a city neighborhood didn’t mean we wouldn’t.

Doris ranked high on our list. We trekked over to her street, a plate of goodies in my right hand, the baby propped on my left hip. My walking littles clutched the hem of my coat, and we trudged to her door through thick snow. Maybe she was too busy shoveling for the neighbors to clear her own. My hands full, I assigned the job of knocking to the toddler and preschooler.

A face in the door’s window. The sound of an unlatching deadbolt, then a chain sliding off its rails.

“Look who it is,” Doris said, her smile warming the air between us.

Behind her, the inside of the house was dark, the living room stacked with newspapers and containers. Near the doorway, a cat curved around a cardboard box, slinking toward us to check our identities.

Flicka handed her the gift of treats. And after that, the girls took turns delivering holiday cheer on red plates each Christmas until the year Doris didn’t come to her door anymore.

“Does she even still live here?” Ricka said.

“I don’t know.” I headed to the woman’s back yard, my now preteen girls scooting along behind me.

We dodged snow-covered garden tools and antique crates, rusted lawn ornaments and a broken wheel barrow, crumbled bricks and bent chicken wire. Maybe leaving a plate of cookies on Doris’ back step was safer. Maybe if we left our gift there it wouldn’t be snapped up by a passerby or squashed by a mail carrier.

But that day, the truth blew through my winter coat: we only knew the gift end of Doris and nothing else of her life. And even then, something told me our visits to her house were almost all used up.

Last week—fifteen years after meeting Doris—I clicked through a Facebook page for neighbors in our small corner of the city. One man grumbled about the meth houses too close to ours. Then he tossed out some facts about a certain address I knew well.

Doris’ house is boarded up now, and there are squatters there. She died a few months ago.

My mouth dried up. Where did our friend spend her last days? Did she have friends or family to see her off to the other side? How did her story end? Did she know we loved her?

I didn’t have the details I wanted, but I knew this much: As sure as Christmas cookies and snow and gift bags left on steps, the City that had hammered up those boards could take them down again, and goodness could move back in.

Doris may be gone, but hope was a survivor.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Happy fourth birthday, My Blonde Life!

My blog—the baby I tend to every Thursday—is growing up. But the big fourth birthday arrived this week, and I hadn’t planned a thing. You’d think I’d track these milestones better.

A hearty thank you to my North Minneapolis neighborhood for providing everything our family needed for a fun celebration for my growing four year old.

Laura from Thirsty Whale saved the day with this six-inch sweet thing.

And then Jimari from North Market rescued me with this ice cream.

And now it’s time to blow out the candles.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

That day

And just like that, everything changed.

(The following blog post was my first, published four years ago now.)

*****

September 11, 2001. That dark Tuesday for the country was the beginning of a new day for my family, but we didn’t know it then.

I heard the news of the terrorist attacks from a friend who called me, breathless, early that morning. In a fog, I watched news coverage later that day in the waiting room of a clinic in our town of Sierra Vista, Arizona. Ricka, just eleven days old at the time, screamed during her appointment when the nurse pricked her heel, squeezing out a single drop of blood for each spot on a card for the lab. Distracted, I took my healthy baby home when it was over.

Wide-eyed and incredulous, we sat in front of our television for days like the rest of the country. I nursed Ricka, and Flicka, who was only twenty-two months old, played on the floor in front of the TV. I recall several living rooms in those days. Our viewing of the nightmare rotated from our living room to our friends’ living rooms, as if watching the horrors on TV in someone else’s house would bring fresh answers, a sound conclusion.

As usual, we Border Patrol wives stuck together. Our husbands continued to go to their jobs on the Mexican border, their station located in the town of Douglas, Arizona. Just because the country was grieving didn’t mean there wasn’t work to do. Maybe even more work now. America wasn’t impenetrable anymore.

Husband worked hot, dusty shifts in the desert. He had been unsatisfied with his job since its beginning three and a half years earlier, and I wondered if he would ever be happy in a job. It didn’t help that his work on the border seemed meaningless to him. The same groups of people crossing over without documentation would be caught in the desert, gathered up, brought to the station to be “idented,” and sent back to Agua Prieta, Mexico, only to return the next day to the same agents, the same scenarios.

Husband came home with stories. Fathers abandoning their families in the desert to escape to the U.S. alone. Desperate mothers tossing their babies over the steel fence separating the U.S. from Mexico. Federal agents finding drugs in a desert also littered with garbage, discarded clothing, full and empty mayonnaise jars—and sometimes a dead body. Eventually, the government instructed the agents to look the other way from illegal border crossings. The success rates would look better that way, and it was all about the numbers. Husband wanted out.

The unabating sun, the choking sandstorms, and Husband’s uniform—stained from the red clay soil of the Sonoran desert—reminded us we were far from where we came. We had two babies, and their mere existence in the world nudged me daily.

Go back home!

We heard reports in our town of “particulate matter”—dried feces—in the air we breathed, higher rates of childhood leukemia, drug use amongst kids as young as third grade, the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the country, and eventually it wasn’t just Husband looking for a way out. Something had stirred in me too.

We kept our ears open. Husband applied for jobs elsewhere—the northern U.S. border as a Border Patrol agent, anywhere as a Secret Service agent, and the Grand Canyon as a Forest Ranger. But it was 9/11—the bleakest of America’s tragedies—that was our way out. The Federal Air Marshal Service under the Department of Homeland Security was suddenly hiring hundreds of new air marshals to supplement their paltry number of pre-9/11 agents.

Nothing about the federal government moves quickly, but the hiring process for Federal Air Marshals was expedited due to a new national sense of insecurity. They demanded coverage, and now. Husband and most of his friends from the Border Patrol in Douglas, Arizona, were hired. Abruptly, our lives changed. The mild winters, monsoon seasons, and slow-paced desert lifestyle came to an end. By March 22, 2002, we handed our house keys to the landlord, slammed the U-Haul doors shut for the last time, tossed one last look behind us at the Huachuca Mountains, and started our trek north.

We spent our first night on the road in a cheap motel in Deming, New Mexico. A long enough travel day for a six-month-old and a two-year-old, we decided. Burrs peppered the carpeting in that motel room, so we kept our shoes on.

We hit blizzard conditions in Nebraska, and memories of my northern Minnesota upbringing smacked me in the face. Oh, that’s right. That’s how winter feels. I was sorry the little ones were wearing light fleece jackets and that I had stepped into flip-flops that morning, but it was cozy in the cab of the U-Haul truck.

Having survived the trip from southeastern Arizona to northwestern Minnesota in four wintry days with a baby, a toddler, our miniature dachshund, and all our earthly possessions, we wended our way to my parents’ home in Newfolden, Minnesota. It was my first time seeing their new house and new dogs—a fresh life together in their almost thirty-eight years of marriage. I pulled Mom and Dad into vice-grip hugs, relieved Dad wasn’t greatly changed from the last time I saw him. The fear I nursed on the trip was that he was worse and no one had told me. But he was between chemo treatments, enjoying an upswing in energy, and ready to play with his little grandgirls.

I looked at Husband. We had made it. I squeezed him tight. We were starting something new. He was a Federal Air Marshal now and would report the next week to a training academy. The girls and I would stay at Mom and Dad’s for as long as it took to find a house in the Twin Cities where Husband’s new station would be.

We didn’t know that in eight weeks, we’d have found our first home—a 1919 stucco—and be living in North Minneapolis, an area we knew nothing about.

We had no idea what was about to go down for us living in the hood.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Coco and the county fair

If the Marshall County Fair back in the late 1970s had been an opera, my older sister Coco would’ve been the prima donna. A true Renaissance 4-H girl, she was a judge’s dream. Only in junior high, she already had talents with a camera, canvas, cloth, cooking, and Checkered Giants (rabbits.) I was in elementary school at the time, and while my younger siblings may have entered items in the fair too, my memories of their efforts are fuzzy; I was too busy trying to emulate Coco to pay much attention.

In four frames, Coco captured the different stages of my cartwheel for a photo series entry. She baked the best julekage and carrot cake I, to this day, have ever tasted. She showcased her sewing skills by altering a dress and transforming it into a skirt/top duo. And she nurtured an all-white male rabbit named Dandelion to winning heights.

My industrious doings, on the other hand, sang an off-key tune. While my dried bean and macaroni kitchen plaque was solidly average, I stitched a misplaced seam on my sewing project, turning my striped skirt with patch pockets into a bag. And for the baking competition, I whipped up some biscuits using baking soda instead of baking powder.

“What’s the difference anyway?” I asked Mom after admitting my mistake in the kitchen. “Does it really matter?”

“Bake them and see,” she said.

The dog wrinkled her nose at the hard orange biscuits that emerged from the oven. I started my projects over, mixing my dough again and later ripping out the stitches in my “bag” too.

If thoughts of the fair judges’ scrutiny rattled us, the promise of the payout kept us motivated. A blue ribbon equaled $3.00, a red ribbon $2.00, and a white $1.00. A grand champion ribbon meant even more money, but I imagined the sense of satisfaction was higher than the dollars earned by winning one.

Coco secured all blue ribbons, with the exception of her julekage and carrot cake; those were grand champion winners. I don’t remember what I won on my biscuits or skirt, but I know I earned a red ribbon on my dried bean and macaroni plaque. And those two dollars made me grin.

The county fair was bigger than ribbons, though. For several shifts a year, we 4-H members and some parents performed a sweaty service manning the food booth, and that was where Coco and I shared equal ground; we both feared making change.

We kids took the customers’ orders, the hot grill spitting grease at us as we scurried by. We plated hamburgers, potato salad, rolls, and pie. We filled cups with coffee and milk. And then came time for the money to change hands.

“$5.15, please,” I said to an older gentleman with a mustache.

He opened his wallet, extracted a twenty-dollar bill, and rummaged in his pocket. He slapped a dime and a nickel down on the counter along with the bill.

I furrowed my brow, plucking up the twenty and waggling it in the air. “This is enough. You don’t need the coins too.”

His eyes smiled even though his mustache stayed even. He nodded toward somebody’s mother who worked the cash register. “Bring it over there, give it to her, and see what happens.”

Wary, I brought the twenty and change to the till. The woman handed me back a ten and a five. A light dawned, and my mouth sagged open. Mr. Mustache had shown me new ways of the world—and making change. I shot a look over my shoulder at him. He winked.

In the evening, we collected our fair items with the judges’ notes affixed to them—and ribbons too, if we were lucky—and loaded them into the station wagon. Coco’s champion baked goods, along with other people’s, had posed for public viewing all day on flimsy plates atop white-papered tables. Flies buzzed in circles over the edible winners, but that didn’t stop us from tearing into the julekage on the ride home and washing down the soft wads of Norwegian Christmas bread with ice-cold strawberry Shastas.

Back at home, we bathed, sponging away the dust from the fair while keeping our memories. Coco displayed her ribbons on a cork board in our shared bedroom, and of course I copied her. As if that year wasn’t success enough, I could tell my big sister already had schemes brewing for the next year’s entries. And maybe I did too.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Angels and bananas

“I drive around the block every night before I head to work,” Edward says, forearms resting on his back gate. “I check on your house too. Make sure everything’s okay over there.”

I try to think of what we did to deserve our own nightshift-working guardian angel who happens to live down the alley and monitors our block while we sleep, but I come up empty.

“I appreciate it,” Husband says, his head bobbing.

“What would we do without you?” And this time when I say it, it’s not a rhetorical question.

Edward’s eyes glow, and the back door of his house swings open. His wife Marie steps out and saunters toward us, a smile splashed on her face.

I exchange a hug with the woman who gave me her grandmother’s ceramic bowls—and warm memories of her whenever I eat soup from them. Before those dishes, though, she gave us something even better: her daughter, whose presence improved our basketball court out back. For years, the sight of that kid’s pump fakes and dribble drives, as she played with at least six other teenagers on our driveway, made my heart clench. In those days, Marie gave all the neighborhood kids stern warnings about practicing manners while they shot hoops at our place too. And my heart squeezes even now.

But we have to leave.

“We’ll have you guys over for pizza,” Husband says for the umpteenth time, even though jobs usually trample our intentions when we pull out our calendars. But hope and pizza live together in our neighborhood, so here we go again.

One summer day, Marie calls, telling me she’s got something for me. She drops off the present—a black garbage bag filled with overripe bananas—on my porch. She rescued the fruit, destined for the dumpster, from her workplace, because why should it all go to waste? I peel, slice, and zip the bananas into freezer bags for their cold sleep. In the winter, I’ll do some baking with Marie’s gift and think of Edward and his watchful rounds night after night. And of course I’ll think of her too, always making our lives sweeter than banana bread.

We fire up the outdoor pizza oven on a rainy Monday, but Edward and Marie are working and can’t make it over for a slice this time either.

“Why don’t you put in your order?” I tell Marie. “We’ll make you a couple for after work. I don’t care how late it is.”

She laughs. “Okay. Sausage, green pepper, and mushrooms for me. Just meat—or whatever you’ve got—for Edward.”

Around ten o’clock that night, she pulls her car up to the curb in front of our house. I head outside, balancing one pizza pan on each palm. She jumps from her vehicle, meets me on the sidewalk, and hugs my middle because my hands are full.

“I would’ve delivered to your house, you know,” I say.

She laughs again. She’s appreciative, she says, but I think I feel it more. While pizzas are nice, I’ll take angels and bananas any day.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Little things: beginnings

I couldn’t think about anything else until I peeked. Just one little look. I wouldn’t have to go further.

I peeled back the tiniest portion of carpeting in the bedroom, and lifting a few square inches in the corner revealed exactly what I wanted: a hardwood floor. Despite its roughness, I spied potential. I ripped further.

It was 2002, and we were new to the house and not in a position to do any renovations yet. But to me, the timing was ideal; Husband was at work.

Nervous excitement roiling my stomach, I tore the stinky old carpeting free from the nails that anchored it. I heaped the offending mass in the dining room, whipping up excuses for why it needed to go that day. Several young children had lived in the house before us. How many times had their bodily fluids puddled up on the beige fibers and seeped through to the pad underneath? And with kids of our own, how many times would we add our own muck to the hard-to-clean textile? It was better off gone.

My picking away at the flooring ushered in a big project, and my impatience propelled it to its end.

Over the years, many other small beginnings have zinged me in the gut too: the initial step into the kindergarten classroom for each of my girls, the starting payment on a large bill, the first word of a manuscript pecked out on my keyboard.  

Frustration floods me—anxiety too sometimes—because first movements seem too tiny to accomplish big things, and I don’t like them. I’d rather jump to the grand, satisfying conclusion: the graduation, the pay-off check, my story’s The End.

But outside of time and space, Someone else values the nearly invisible debut, the almost imperceptible start.

Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Little things: the ten blocks

I drive along Dowling, a busy avenue in my North Minneapolis neighborhood. As I travel the ten blocks I know like my own hands, a quote swirls through my brain.

Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you’ll look back and realize they were the big things.

Small doings are in plain sight, but repetition has killed the landscape for me. I gaze at my surroundings now, resurrecting them. I want to see again.

More than a decade ago, the shoe repair shop with the clever sign—“We can heel you and save your sole”—at Dowling and Fremont vanished, leaving behind a blank plot of land. Today a man and woman, bent like twin hairpins, work the piece of earth where the shop once stood. It’s not an established community garden, but they till it up each spring anyway, hiding their vegetable seeds in the fresh furrows. The City isn’t onto them yet, or else the lot would lie fallow again. I want to clap for them, cheer for their success in bringing food from nothing right in the middle of everything.   

I roll on. Another farmer tends her property. But what is she doing? I’m happy for the red light, so I can see more. She lugs a watering can to the sidewalk in front of her house and sprinkles the length of one crack, then the next. Did she plant seeds between the slabs of concrete? Or is she nurturing the weeds that sprout from the gaps? I forget I have a passenger in my car—it’s Dicka today—and she’s watching the careful irrigation of cement too. She laughs, and the light turns green.

A block further, a three-legged pit bull hops along the sidewalk at the end of a leash, tongue dangling from his smile, his human affixed to the other end. The man’s strides are slow, matching those of his animal. I’ve seen that dog before—and his man—and those two own each other. The leash is just a formality society demands, because their affection would hold them together just fine.

Food coaxed from city ground. A drink for the cracks. Love on both ends of a tether. My ten blocks have cheered me today. And my eyes are open now.

What about yours?

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.