He who can’t understand your silence will not understand your words. ~Unknown

Sometimes words won’t come, or the words that do can’t express what one wants to say. Sometimes the words are there, but cannot be spoken and must remain locked in one’s heart.

That’s when listening with the heart is the only way to hear.

My Family

Brody, Carter, Gayle, Bill and Kennedy.

Poetry in Motion

Sitting on the sidelines of a soccer field today watching Kennedy guest-play on a team coached by Gayle's college roommate, I overheard some people behind me talking. Kennedy's name had been mentioned.

"Who's Kennedy?" one asked.

"She's a guest player. She's the little fast one."

I smiled to myself. Yep. That pretty much describes 11-year-old Kennedy. She was definitely the smallest player on the field, and a year younger than most, if not all, of the other girls. But fast she is. She runs like a gazelle. She leaps across the field, zigzagging to wherever she needs to be. If you blink, you may miss her.

Kennedy was a full term baby, but she weighed under 6 lbs. She was born screaming. Feisty. But sweet. Determined. But kind, and champion of the underdog. Unless the underdogs are the opposing team. Then, not so much. She likes to win. As a baby and toddler, she earned the nickname of "Houdini" because she could escape any restraint, which has translated to being able to slip through small openings in packs of aggressive soccer players with the ball in her possession, and "Mighty Might" because of her sheer determination at anything she attempted. There was no stopping her. There still isn't.

At another soccer game a few months back, I overheard a teammate's father call her "The Streak".

Today, she earned that nickname again when a teammate who was being pressed on the other side of the field passed the ball to Kennedy. She seized the ball in the open, moved like a flash toward the goal and launched it over the goalie's head into the net. Her grace and agility, the ease with which she moved, the absolute perfection of her lithe body, brought tears to my eyes. Poetry in motion. That's Kennedy.

Picky, Picky

I told her I wasn’t picky. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that isn’t true.

On a whim, I walked into the hair salon next to where I work out in the morning. I love the girl who has been cutting my hair in her home for a few years. She is a sweetheart and gives a good haircut at a reasonable price. I wasn’t really shopping for a new stylist, but when I couldn’t reach her the last time I needed her (for a couple of weeks), I panicked and started looking around, “just in case”. She did finally return my calls, and cut my hair. But the seed was planted: I need a backup.

So back to picky. I told the girl at the desk I wanted to schedule a haircut with someone who can cut thin hair and make it look good. I have cowlicks, too. I told her I wasn't picky. Jana will cut my hair this afternoon and we’ll see.

When I left the salon, I realized I really am picky. Yes, I want a good haircut, but I really want more than that. I want new hair…thicker, that’s more brown than gray that doesn’t have to be “touched up” from a bottle. I’ll keep the gray streak in front, it’s kinda cool, and I earned those little badges of courage one at time. I want a new face. You can leave the smile wrinkles, but I’d really appreciate your erasing the frown wrinkles. I want a new body, too. Younger, thinner, the way it was about 40 years ago. I’ll keep my stretch marks from pregnancy -- they are reminder of the wonder of new life. I’m willing to work for the thinner part. I know there are no free lunches (oops, the food reference just slipped in there).

So Jana, we’ll start with the new hair style today, but let’s be thinking about the rest, ok?

The Experiment

Leroy was never my favorite person at work. In fact, for a long time, he was my least favorite. But, in the end, he taught me an important lesson, and I will always be grateful.

The mini-man, missing only the hand-in-the-front-of-the-jacket portion of a Napoleonic pose, flung open the glass entry door of the NCR branch office at 2116 Madison Avenue and passed the front office staff without a word or glance. We ignored him, too, because we had learned that as often as not, an encounter with Leroy could suck the sunshine right out of one’s day.

Leroy was a senior cash register salesman, with his own territory and expense account, and from time-to-time, a junior salesman working under his supervision. In his 50’s, he was several inches under six feet tall, somewhat stout though not fat, with graying sandy-colored hair. His wife, Jane, was perhaps a little taller than he, a pleasant woman, a necessary recipient of my pity. They had no children, but Jane was a stay at home wife, and she occasionally shared recipes with us office girls.

I was in my early 20’s, young, holding my first real job, burdened with the mistaken notion that we respect those older than us or in positions superior to ours simply “because”. Leroy displayed no compunction claiming that counterfeit respect. The truth was, I was afraid of him. Better to be ignored by him than engaged by him. More than once he had reduced one of us in our office to tears by bullying over some unimportant matter. I had succumbed to one of his tirades myself. Although Irma, the branch manager’s secretary and big sister figure to us younger girls, armed me with protection (don’t cry, get mad!), I found that my best defense was simply to look through Leroy as if he didn’t exist.

I ignored his self-important entry that day as I did most. But once again, after he had passed by, I felt a niggling, uncomfortable feeling that as unpleasant as he was, I didn’t enjoy disliking him. Our worst encounter was at least months, maybe more, behind us. The emotional pain he had inflicted was now not even a dull ache, but just a subconscious bad memory. Still, the sight of him reminded me that I was not on good terms with all people. A thought came to me, I wonder what he would do if I was nice to him. I decided to experiment.

The next day he again blasted through the front door and marched over to the cabinet at the counter where we filed salesmen’s mail and messages. He snatched a handful of small pink telephone slips from his folder, put on his reading glasses and began shuffling through them.

Mustering up courage with a silent deep breath and my best casual voice, I ventured, “How was your day, Leroy?” He went on reading for a few seconds, then looked up at me, tilted his head down and glared at me suspiciously over his glasses. “Why do you ask?”

I shrugged. “No reason, just wondering how it went. You were in Port Clinton today, right?”

He hesitated, seeming to weigh the possibility that I had ulterior motives. Evidently convinced that was not likely, he replied, and we momentarily engaged in casual conversation about the customers he had called on. And then he walked down the hallway to his office.

Well, that was interesting, I thought. He was almost pleasant.

Each time I repeated the experiment, it became easier. There were no further brow-beating, humiliation-inducing outbursts directed at me or at anyone else amongst our office staff. Leroy had been disarmed by kind words. My feigned interest in him became genuine after awhile, and when he passed away suddenly a few years later, I was truly saddened. He had become my friend.