[Unpublished, February 1995]
Long winter evenings have always challenged families; the Hagley Museum in Wilmington, Delaware recently hosted an afternoon of “19th century winter pastimes…once-popular parlor games challenging the mind or the memory.” For some readers, early March will bring more snowstorms, and a list of old parlor games sounds appealing.
But who needs outmoded forms of entertainment, when you can keep jolly the Wiedro way? “The Wiedros” became our family alias when daughter Megan, attempting to enter the surname “Weirdo” on a computer questionaire at Disneyworld, logged something like “Wiedr O” instead. On our last Wiedro outing we visited museums in Delaware’s Brandywine Valley, then spent abed-and-breakfast evening, free from all electronic diversions. Here are the pastimes taht helped pass our time—some old familiars, some invented on the spot. The first is a guiding principle:
1. Drive it into the ground. Don’t let a promising topic go until it’s exhausted.
[Books & Culture, November 1995]
When I was down to the Big City not long ago, my youthful friend Rod took me to his favorite bookstore-cafe. We sat on high stools at a small, sticky square of yellow wood, buffeted by alternative rock flowing from the excellent sound system. I chose, at Rod's suggestion, a designer beer that the menu described as ”fruity and complex.“ Nearby, patrons lingered at blond-wood book racks, perusing the handsome volumes with impressive nonchalance. Diversity spread her amiable wings: elbowpatch-and-beret types mingled easily with Birkenstocker-backpackers en tout noir. So when Rod came up to Baltimore I took him to my favorite book source, across the street from the Friend General Store and Love Nest Package Liquors. The bulky one-story building fills nearly a city block; it is painted rosy beige with deeper-brown trim, and topped with romantic crenellations. The orange metal sign bolted to the wall reads ”Baltimore Department of Finance, Bureau of Purchases, Warehouse #9." But those familiar with its charms eschew the formal title; we call it the Baltimore Book Dump.
Unpublished, May 1998]
Come on in! Just have a seat on the sofa, and my husband will be in in a minute with some coffee. Where’s the bathroom? Ah, better have a seat first. I need to explain something. I should tell you why the walls are lumpy.
Last summer I was looking at that paneling—well, actually, I guess it really began back when we bought the house, a few years ago—no, to tell the truth—
It all started when I was about six, and built a fort of sofa cushions on the living room floor.
As late fall slides to winter, across the country Christians are winding up another year of living the religious life. Late fall, and across the country members of the American Academy of Religion are winding up another year of studying the religious life.
The distinction between living it and studying it may seem artificial; most Christians study scripture, as well as theology and devotional works. But the study based in faith is not like the study of religion per se. In the halls of academe, religion is just one more sociological phenomenon, to be appraised from a safe distance (after all, He may not be a tame lion). Not that all the members of the Academy are religious abstainers; there are mainliners, goddess-worshippers, Buddhists, and the odd evangelical or two. But the AAR meets in the ivory tower, not the church.
[NPR, “All Things Considered,” October 6, 1997]
I was thumbing through a high-brow magazine the other day and came across an interesting essay on the virtue of Hope. But before I'd finished the first page I caught them in an embarassing blooper. The author stated that hope is ranked alongside faith and love in the 23rd psalm.
In case you didn't catch the faux pas, run through the 23rd psalm in your mind--you probably memorized it in kindergarten. Yes, “the Lord is my shepherd is there,” and the part about the valley of the shadow of death, but there's no mention of faith, hope, and love. For that, you have to flip to the other end of the Bible, to St. Paul's first letter to the Corinthians. In his famous meditation on love in chapter 13, he writes, “So faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” --Now, does it ring a bell?
[Christianity Today, September 6, 1999] I didn't go to see “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me;” I went to see the historic theater where it happened to be playing. But when those psychedelic colors started spilling off the screen I couldn't resist. Austin Powers, the ersatz James Bond, is a weenie with a Herman's Hermits haircut
[Christianity Today, January 11, 1999]
When I was first approached about becoming a member of the Spice Girls, I was a little taken aback. My impression was that this troupe of British singers was salacious and provocative, one more example of the debasing of our culture.
“I'm embarassed to admit it, Mom,” my 21-year-old daughter confessed, “but I actually liked the movie. It's harmless--a teenybopper thing, like for preteen girls. It's singing Barbies, and there's nothing dirty about it. It has that nutty English humor, kind of like the Beatles' Help!, so I actually ended up really enjoying it--I even watched it twice.”
[Religion News Service, April 16, 1996]
The latest animal-rights action spreads beyond usual bounds: members of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals plan to disrupt a sport-fishing tournament by throwing rocks in the water to warn the fish. (Presumably they hope not to hit any fish in the process.)
[NPR, “All Things Considered,” May 20, 1997]
I've walked a hundred miles in another woman's shoes, and I don' t even know her name. I've ironed her blouse, hemmed her skirt, and carried her handbag. She's not one person, but a composite of dozens, women of all ages and races and creed.
But there is one thing they all had in common: they were all mostly my size.
[Religion News Service, May 28, 1996]
I found out the other day I have a pancreas. Not that I would have ever denied it; I know that the existence of such things is generally taken for granted, and one would disagree only at the risk of looking foolish. If the phone rang and it was a pollster inquiring about mine, I'd know the correct answer: “Yup, got it right here.”
Where, exactly, I wouldn't be sure. In fact, that whole arrangement of complicated, slippery items on the dark inside of the torso is a mystery to me. I can't see them, so maybe they aren't there.
