Three Houses

This is a story of three houses.

To get a rental in this town, you have to be aggressive (which we are not) and willing to make a quick commitment (which we also are not) because things get snatched up so quickly.

Michael and I are more of the type that sit down, discuss, pray, go over budget, discuss, pray some more, and then!....the opportunity has passed us by.

Our current house was great because it got us here to Abilene, but it wasn’t intended for our family. Since we moved in, we have had another child, making an already too-small house even more cramped. There is no dishwasher so we have had to wash all the dishes by hand. There is a one car driveway that the landlord put in for us, but one of us always had to park on the street. And we are directly across from campus (specifically the stadium) meaning every single time there is any event whatsoever, there are cars clogging up our street and taking up our parking and making life generally more annoying.

After the unpleasant incident with the first rental house, we decided to make a few phone calls from signs we saw nearby. Of those, three emerged as possibilities:

A four-bedroom on the other side of Campus Court across Ambler

The house next door

And a dark horse contender on the other side of 10th.

We go and see the first one, which turned out to be too small. When we move, we know that it will likely be our home for quite a while because we tend to settle in. The bedrooms are smaller, more suited to the college students that typically rent properties like this. It has a small backyard and roses out front and a garage the current residents are using as a cool hang out area, but Michael and I know before we leave that it wasn’t the right fit for us.

The next day, we walk over to see the house next door.

A lot of our problems—proximity to campus, busy streets—would still have to be dealt with, but there was a two garage and additional parking. This house was beautiful and spacious, four large bedrooms, and an additional office off the master. The backyard had a covered patio that was topped with a super cool deck which meant we could host things. Not a ton of yard for the dog, but it also meant less mowing. Rent was higher but manageable for that much extra space. We would really be able to breathe.

The family that owned it could only offer it for a year though, as their youngest son would be taking over it in his junior year. If it hadn’t been for that stipulation, we might have said yes to it that day, but the idea of having to move again so soon stopped us.

Our hopes rested on this one last house.

The owner of the too-small first rental mentioned that he would have a four-bedroom available at the beginning of May, over on Scott Place. If we’d like to see it.

It was on a quiet street, near the end of a cul de sac. Little kids ran and played in neighboring yards, and it was quiet and peaceful and definitively suburban.

The very nice landlord met us at the door and let us look around. It was several hundred more square feet than our current house, with two living areas, two dining areas, a two car garage, and three bedrooms. He said he was going to get construction in there to convert the formal dining area into a fourth bedroom, but came down on the rent price when we said three bedrooms would be fine for now.

This home sparked my imagination. I could hear in my head my mother-in-law asking, “where would you put your Christmas tree?” Rhonda loves Christmas and that is usually her first question about a new place. I could see our stockings hung from the mantle over the (functional) fireplace, the tree decked out and lit up next to it.

The laundry room has a perfect area for the dog’s bed, and the covered back porch would be the best for Gabriel’s hammock swing. Ben and Emerald would be thrilled they still have pecans to collect and sell to my mother in the winter. The sprinkler system in the front would keep our grass so green and lovely.

And y’all. My closet.

There is more storage places everywhere, for stockpiling the girls’ diabetes supplies and Gabe’s incontinent supplies, for putting away all of these things that right now have no place. There are places I can put all my Christmas decorations.

There’s even a dishwasher!

There are still some considerations we have had to make. Currently, there is no washer and dryer, so we will have to get some. We have two living rooms to fill with furniture but in a parallel to our first apartment, we only have one recliner. We are on the lookout for new seating options. Neither of these things concern us too greatly because they are fixable problems.

I didn’t want to get my hopes up because I loved this house with its soft carpet for Tula to crawl around on and its charming wallpaper and the serenity that envelopes it from all sides.

Yesterday, Michael got the keys. Today we started moving in.

And I have not been able to stop grinning.

I got my house!

—Andie—

Summertime

Michael has long teased by calling me a hillbilly. I guess compared to him, the description is apt. He has a citified air about him, the comfort around crowds and culture, a keener awareness of political and world matters. Maybe that’s just been my idealized perception of him. Comparatively, with my firmly rural background, I am a virtual country bumpkin (fresh as frost out on the pumpkin).

No time makes me as aware of that distinction as summertime--the part of the year my siblings and I were let loose in the woods surrounding our home to roam barefoot and semi-feral until school came back in session.

It is hard to reconcile that former version of myself with the current. When did I become so domesticated? Was it simply a part of growing up, or did I abandon a piece of my country roots along the way? Is that such a bad thing?

Summer was (and is) my favorite season. I have a belief that we are conditioned to prefer the weather surrounding our birthdays because we spend all year looking forward to it as children. To April-born Michael, gray and foggy days are ideal; with my mid-June birth, the best weather is optimally over 100 degrees, golden and sunny.

My hometown was a suburb of a suburb of Dallas/Fort Worth, this moment on the map you pass through on the way to real cities. My siblings and I were part of the last generation to get to wander; I can't even imagine letting my little ones freely roam the neighborhood as I did at that age.

Royce, Jarrod, Amber, and I would ride bikes until Dad’s whistle would call us home for meals. After it rained, the creeks behind our house overflowed so we would go out with the Summers girls to catch crawdads. Wild green onion grew all over which we would harvest to present as bouquets to our mother, dirt still clinging to the small white bulbs.

When the sun went down, Amber and I would hunt for bullfrogs, gathering them in ten-gallon buckets to release en masse on our front porch, watching them hop away and disappear into the night. Fireflies we held in our hands, their little lights flickering a message to the swarm of their compatriots flittering around our head.

My grandparents--my dad’s mother and father--had a swimming pool with a deck around it and lived just a few minutes away. We spent a lot of time swimming over there, never-ending games of Marco Polo and making whirlpools that would carry you around on the current. I'd lay out on my Little Mermaid towel and let the sun warm me until I was too hot, then jump back in. Pawpaw grilled hot dogs, saying that he made them special just for me, and I'd smile and say they were my favorite, even though I didn't like hot dogs. Sometimes Grandma Pat would make a pallet for us in her room so we could rest, watching California Raisins or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle cartoons.

Barbeques are pretty traditional for every southern kid I would imagine. Dad and his buddies would get together and get out the smokers to fill them with meat that slow cooked for hours. Standing around drinking cold sodas and beer fished out of galvanized tubs full of ice, they'd keep an eye on the meat; inside, the ladies made all manner of mayonnaise-based salads and beans while sipping on margaritas and telling the kids to get outside and play.

A lot of summers, before Dad got sick, we’d get up one morning while it was still dark outside and load up in the car to drive to Great Grandma Hill’s house. She lived in Littleton, Colorado, in the part that is Centennial now, so it would take twelve or so hours of straight driving. Dad has a weakness for hole-in-the-wall restaurants in dinky towns, places that made better stories than food. We’d break up the drive by staying in cheap motels occasionally, but Dad prefers to drive straight on through with as few breaks as possible, except for those little restaurants.

I can still remember Grandma’s house. Not everything, just bits and pieces. She loved butterflies, and collected dolls, including Little Miss No Name. We drank out of jam jars with cartoon characters on the side while she taught us how to play cribbage. If we were lucky, she'd make what we called cabbage rolls--German runzas filled with hamburger and cabbage that we couldn't get enough of.

Between summer visits, Grandma was my pen pal. I'd send her drawings and accounts of school, and she would tell me about her childhood and how the other members of the family were doing. Letters cost around 32 cents to send at that time, so I’d scrounge around to find enough loose change to leave in the mailbox. They don't let you do that now; you have to have a stamp. Maybe they didn't let you back then either, but our mailman always took it and the letter. When a bird built its nest in our mailbox, mom and dad started using a p.o. box and it became harder for me to maintain a correspondence.

Grandma started me on my ceramic cow collection. I loved cows when I was growing up, so she gave me the cows that held creamer for coffee which poured out through their mouth, beautiful handpainted ones with scenes on the side. I named them all and kept them for years, until they unfortunately got smashed during a move.

In Colorado, mom and dad would take us hiking in the mountains. Dad would carry me over the streams that I was too frightened to walk through. We used birthday money to buy fool’s gold at mountain gift shops, plotting how we would use it to buy a mansion for mom so she'd never have to work again. Drawstring bags of gum that looked like coal turned our mouths a most becoming shade of black.

Ten was a special birthday because then you were old enough to go to camp. We went with our church youth group to Camp Deer Run (where the deer run) in Winnesboro, Texas. That was one of my favorite places in the world, a place I felt an unparalleled closeness to God.

Summertime was always heavy on church activities. Summer Youth Series brought kids from congregations all over the metroplex to sing and worship together. Volunteer projects, lock-ins, devotionals, and outings outside of regular service kept our hearts and our minds in the right place and out of trouble.

In High School, summer always ended in band camp. For a while, they are all day--get there early in the morning and practice hard until dinner. The band director kept it fun by bringing orange juice and kolaches in the morning. Taco Bueno would sell us tacos four for a dollar for lunch, or she'd bring pizza. At the end of the long, hot day of practice, we’d put a movie on in the band hall and wind down before starting it all again the next day.

I've had all of this on my mind because Emerald has said, loudly, daily, and to anyone who will listen, how very much she hates summer. She misses school, misses her friends. She isn't learning anything. And (as Benjamin so succinctly put it), “two months!? But that's too much time with mommy!”

How could anyone hate this magical time of year? The time of going fishing and camping, boating out on the lake and sleeping under the stars. Of visiting family you rarely get to see and go on adventures in places unknown. Getting pickle slushes from the public swimming pool, attending vacation bible school, lounging in the sun, and reading a new pile of books from the library every week. This season was a celebration of enjoying yourself, a break from the stresses of school.

It's made me question if I just don't plan enough for the kids to do over the summer. We are somewhat tied to the house in an effort to miss as few therapy sessions as possible, as well as finances and having three difficult children (Benjamin is less difficult and more of the “grab and go” variety).

But she still gets a fair amount of trotting around. She goes to vbs and swim lessons, visiting family. We enroll her in activities and take her on as many vacations as we feel we can safely manage. We have a lot going on.

Which makes me wonder: was I appreciative enough at the time of what a good life I led? Did I thank my mother, or did I complain that it was too hot and I was bored? Were we begging our parents to take us to Disney World, pouting that we “never got to go anywhere fun”?

Was my mother as discouraged as I get, feeling like no matter how much we do, it's never enough?

I may not be able to fly the kids to Hawaii as they suggested, but I can take them fishing. Teach them how to tell the difference between a frog and a toad, and how to catch a firefly without squishing him. Make cabbage rolls for them and tell stories about their Great Great Grandma Hill that had this laugh that made you feel happy to your toes. We can make whirlpools and let the current carry us away, and eat hot dogs laying in the sun.

And, with any luck, they will look back on their summers when they're grown as fondly as I do mine.

An Inclusive Church

At the October REACH community meeting, I am the speaker. As with most things I do, I am not really certain how I ended up in the place, likely from a single offhanded comment that I enthusiastically ran with, but I have thrown myself into it with my usual vigor.

The subject is “An Inclusive Church”--making churches safe and welcoming places for individuals with special needs.

I am FAR from an expert on the subject. I have no formal training of any kind on really any matter. That part is kind of making me nervous. Public speaking doesn’t bother me; I get antsy right before, but once it comes down to it the combination of my extensive research and practice combined with my inherent passion and earnestness wins out.

Above all, I want to have something worthwhile to say. This conversation needs to happen. Statistics have shown that 90% of families with a disabled member do not have a church home. When you’re talking about nearly 1 in 5 American families, that is a genuine problem.

What is keeping these families out of the church? What can we do to fix it?

What makes me think that I will have anything worth hearing to say on the subject?

I do have my own experiences--one bad, three good--since Gabriel was diagnosed. My observations. And one sad fact: I do not know a single special family, my own included, that has not been asked to leave a church.

We wanted the kids to grow up going to Sunday school like we had, but we were having trouble finding the right fit for our family. Michael and I were young, 24 and 22 respectively, and our religious beliefs were still solidifying, not yet quite fully realized. Both of us grew up in the Church of Christ, learning roughly the same basic traditions and beliefs and practices; we expanded on our well of knowledge at LCU with more challenging advanced theological study (Michael being a youth and family ministry major for several years, he was exposed to more than I was). We were at the point of sifting through all that we were taught and holding it up to our own interpretations to see if we could figure out exactly our particular brand of Christianity looked like.

In Lubbock, I can remember maybe four or five big Church of Christs. We chose ours based on proximity more than anything else, I would imagine. Being relatively awkward socially, I struggle bonding with new people and I had not made friends; Michael is reclusive by nature and is comfortable being on the outside looking in. So though we had attended off and on for a while, we really hadn’t connected with anyone or found our niche.

It shouldn’t have hurt when they (kindly) suggested we worship elsewhere then. I remember sitting there, confused by the language and not really following what was being said. My ear hurt; was I getting an ear infection? I didn’t want an ear infection. What do they give you for one if you’re allergic to penicillin? That was what I was thinking while Michael held my hand and I nodded when it seemed to be an appropriate time and made vague sounds of consent.

At dinner at Michael’s parents later that night, he was telling them how the kids would not be welcomed back to the church’s parents-day-out program the upcoming semester, how they had suggested we would be more comfortable in a different congregation. I remember being confused, arguing with him. That wasn’t what they said, was it? I thought we were just discussing Gabriel’s problem behaviors again.

We had several meetings like that over the course of the year that he had attended there. They were scarcely productive meetings. I had found out a literal hot minute ago that Gaby was autistic--following their recommendation to pursue testing. They were asking me for tips and strategies on how to deal with it.

Why did they think I had the answers? They had more experience, knew more about it at this point than I did!

We would sit there in another one of those interminable meetings, discussing a plan like I knew what I was doing, wide-eyed and pleading because I didn’t know what to do and this was my life now. I didn’t have any answers, I didn’t know who did. This massive, scary thing was crushing down on me…..

...and they were telling us to get out.

No matter how kindly or well-intentioned that was, it SUCKED. They had told me I needed to get Gaby tested for this, and when I did and it turned out he had it, they didn’t want us anymore.

We were devastated. It is like being broken up with. Doesn’t matter that you knew they weren’t the one for you, that it wasn’t going to last forever. It still hurts when they say it is over.

There was a lot I didn’t like about that church. I remember wandering around that first Sunday looking for a class and no one seemed to notice or care that I was there. More sermons than not we had not necessarily agreed with. It wasn’t a bad church, it just wasn’t the right place for us. And the longer we stayed, the more obvious it was that we didn’t fit in.

It took us awhile to work up the courage to try the place they had suggested. Why bother? So they can kick us out, too? Besides, it is way across town and we have heard that it is fairly -whispers “liberal”-. Yeah, I don’t know. That doesn’t sound like the right place for us.

Emerald kept asking if we were going back to bible class though. That is a hard thing to listen to, but what is even worse is watching her face fall when you say, “Not today, honey” week after week. The death blow is when she just stops asking.

So we swallowed our hurt and pocketed our fear of rejection, and we showed up the next Sunday hoping for the best.

How so delighted they were to see us, like they had been standing there holding those doors open just waiting for us to come in all this time. The church is far from small, boasting hundreds if not thousands of members. But they noticed that we were new, and wanted to make us feel welcomed and wanted.

The special needs minister took the time to talk to us, get to know our family and introduce us to the other families like ours, making sure to invite me to the mom’s support group. No chance at being a shrinking violet here because there were so many people that wanted to talk to you, get to know you.

We went to that church for several years, until we moved from Lubbock to Abilene, and during that time I fell in love with it. The teachers for the adult classes were so intelligent and had such engaging discussions--no fluff-piece, baby food lessons. They wanted you thinking, talking, participating. We were making friends, both through the mom’s special needs support group and also through our bible class, who seemed like a big group of best friends.

They took such amazing care of our babies, too. Gabriel we never worried about, never once heard a negative word about. No more scary sit down meetings about how much trouble he was; they thought he was cute and funny and smart and genuinely seemed to enjoy having him in their class.

After Emerald was diagnosed, I thought it was going to be hard to leave her, but her teachers were caring and informed which gave me such peace of mind. Plus they actually had a doctor on standby during services in case of emergencies; how amazing is that?

That may have been the hardest thing to leave in Lubbock. We didn’t want to leave Michael’s family behind and LCS was a good community, but we were scared we were not going to be able to find another place like that one for Gaby.

On first moving to Abilene, we started going to church where my brother and his family plus my mother went, way out on the far side of town.

This church was culture shock, coming from such a big, well-funded congregation to this tiny little home-style country church. There were maybe 50 people, probably less, a good portion of them Jarrod and his group of friends. They made up for their numbers by having the biggest hearts though. It felt like a tight-knit little family where everyone had to work.

The preacher’s wife, an elementary school teacher, volunteered right away to be Gabriel’s buddy. She stayed with him in class and helped him participate, or took him for walks if he was getting too worked up and agitated. No one seemed bothered that he stole food and made messes, or that he was often quite loud during service.

I had already adopted this attitude that you see in a lot of mothers of special needs kids--an existence of constant apology. We don’t make eye contact and apologize profusely for behaviors we should have no reason to be sorry for, things we cannot help. We hold ourselves with a general air of being a burden, just by our being here because so often people are inconvenienced or annoyed by what our kids do. (Disclaimer: Obviously not true of every special mother.).

There is really two reactions to that: either you can get righteously indignant and fight, or you can bow your head and mumble apologizes. I am the latter.

At the beginning of going to that kind little church, I apologized a lot. For Gaby’s messes, for his noises. For Emerald’s outbursts. Sorry I came. So sorry. Sorry I am here. I’ll go now.

The longer we stayed, I stopped feeling like I had to be sorry because everyone was happy to see us, happy we were there. There was this guy that Gabriel just bonded with--no discernable reason other than he just liked the look of this fella, and every time we walked in the door Gabe would run up and give him a hug. He was content and making friends, and we enjoyed service. The members’ beliefs seemed to run the complete gamut, but they believed in friendly discourse regardless, which made for some thought-provoking discussions I enjoyed a great deal.

It was costing us a fortune in gas to get back and forth that we could not afford; circumstances led us to try another church, one that was just down the street from our house. And I mean that literally--if you stand on our front yard, you can see the church.

I went by myself the first time. My overall impression was positive, from caring, helpful people to a service that comfortably fit within my own ideals of church. I left a card requesting more information, describing our particular situation. That week, I got an email from two elders, the guy that helped me find a class (actually not certain of his official position at the church, but he seems to have a hand in just about everything), the preacher, and the children’s minister. The last one set up a time with me to come out and talk to us about Gaby and to meet him before we brought him in.

That right there, guys. That is what got me.

Everyone was so sweet in sending those messages, making me feel like they noticed and cared that I had attended and actually wanted me to visit again. But that children’s minister made it for me. She came to our house and said they would do anything they needed to do to make sure that Gabriel was taken care of and that we were happy and comfortable bringing him there. She listened, she asked questions. She made us feel confident with taking our special boy to this place, that he was wanted and celebrated and would be loved.

We all went that next Sunday, placed membership a few months later, and have been going ever since.

Another day assured us we made the right choice. I had posted on this blog how hard it was for us to go to small groups because of how difficult it is to feed us. An elder that Sunday came up after service and personally invited us--particularly Gabriel--to small group at his house that night, saying us we would be welcomed. We did go, and that invitation made a big impact on me.

It is hard to think sometimes how limited the choices of special needs families can be. Where our kids go to school or daycare, where we live and work, what restaurants and stores and fun places that we can go are all often decided for us because of how it will positively or negatively impact our child. Wouldn’t it be nice if our choice of church was not limited by who would and would not accept Gaby?

That is why I am speaking at the meeting in October. I want to start the discussion--get the thought into people’s minds. I won’t be telling this rather long story; that is really just for my own personal reflection. And to thank you, whoever is reading this, if you were part of one of those three churches that have been so good to us. It was because I saw how good it could be that made me want to help find that for every special family.

If you are in the area and want to come to this community meeting, you are more than welcome. Please RSVP at the email listed on the flyer; we will be happy to have you.

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