John Loughran Gillen 4/22/2020 -- 9/27/1984

 April 22, 1920 -- A boy is born in a small house in a small patch town in the soft-coal country of Fayette County, Pennsylvania, right down on the West Virginia border. His mother is tired. She's raised three children nearly to adulthood and buried a few more, fed and cared for her coal-miner husband, held her breath through explosions and strikes and mines working out and harsh weather and coal dust. In the first few months, she's convinced she has a stomach bug. But the blue-eyed charmer, her "change-of-life baby," grows into a witty, curious, wisecracking storyteller; a prankster; an autodidact; a spinner of yarns.

After graduating from high school, he went down the mine for a hot minute, decided that wasn't for him, and sweet-talked his way into a job in the company store -- based strictly on his ability to touch type. When war broke out shortly after, he enlisted in the Coast Guard and soon found himself in the United States Navy, one more young ordinary seaman in a long line of earnest, dedicated patriots who were going to save the world from totalitarianism.

The war left its mark on him and he would spend most of his later years refusing to talk about it. Once, when "I'll Be Home for Christmas" came on the radio, someone overheard him say to his wife "You know, Sunshine, a lot of the fellas never made it home for Christmas." The eavesdropper saw him blink back tears and that was about as deep as it got. More went unsaid than said; it took a diligent search years later of his service records to learn what he had done -- and where he did it -- in his quest to secure freedom for all people.

Somewhere in there was a brief, unhappy marriage that ended in the most cliched way imaginable: A quick divorce in Reno en route to California, where he'd marry his emerald-eyed princess and (finally) have a little girl. They ended up living the other postwar cliche: A ranch-style tract house in a quiet suburban setting with good schools; three cars (his mother-in-law lived with them almost from the start -- and it was HIS IDEA!); enough money (not tons, but enough); and ready access to groceries, medical care and the basic necessities of suburban life.

Working in procurement at a Los Angeles-area division of U.S. Steel in the years before strict government purchasing regulations, he was part of a team known for . . . uhhhh . . . making sure there wasn't too much surplus material left onsite to rot. Not one of those men had a patio cover made of less than #18 rebar and "nobody knew" where it came from. His wife grew roses, pelargoniums and fuschias, all fussy plants that required loads of attention, while he proudly tended their dichondra lawns. Nobody ate inside all summer (redwood patio table with attached benches, right?) and the wives had the good sense not to ask why their deskbound husbands were coming home with cases of top-grade steaks every few weeks. Suppliers sent them Christmas baskets, football tickets and weekends at the Spa in Palm Springs.

The little girl was sweet, a little mouthy, a terrible room tidier, pleasant, a good student, relatively compliant and not much trouble (until later). She adored her Daddy. The mother-in-law had her own activities and an endless parade of "gentleman callers" but the foursome was strongest and happiest together. Holidays were a dizzying festival of 12-foot Christmas trees, marathon baking sessions, all-night giftwrap parties, and Thanksgivings shared with visiting colleagues from countries that had no comparable tradition. The daughter remembers her Daddy telling the family about a man from Thailand he'd invited because he was "damned if I'll let him be all alone for Thanksgiving." (The man came, utterly bewildered, and had absolutely no idea what Thanksgiving was all about. But he got into the spirit of the thing, ate heartily and seemed to enjoy himself.)

The man was a deep believer, a committed Christian who said almost nothing about his faith but tried to live it with every breath. No hard-luck story was too improbable for him, no villainy was unforgivable and no "holiday orphan" was uninvited. Militantly unchurched, he angrily rejected Catholicism but requested a Catholic funeral. He declined to go to even a Christmas Eve service with his wife and daughter but refused to put his (copperplate) signature on the funny, secular cards his wife brought home one year. (Fear not, he gently persuaded her to exchange them -- no voices were raised and no tears were shed. After that, she sent religious Christmas cards until the end of her days.) The family lived on paradox, I guess.

He wasn't perfect; he was no saint. There were dark spots, storm clouds, ice-cold quarrels, red-hot quarrels, horrible times. This is neither the time nor the place to enumerate their nauseating ugliness. Suffice to say there was enough love in that simple suburban house to keep everybody going.

When the daughter, having spent a week in Washington, D.C. during her senior year of high school, expressed a desire to go to college there, his wife quailed at the idea. "She is NOT going that far away! She's too young and Washington, D.C. is nothing but crime!" she shouted, cowering in horror. (To this day, nobody knows if she meant street crime or the Nixon administration.) He held his tongue and his temper. "Just think it over, Sunshine," he said. "She's headstrong and hardheaded; if we force her to go to the small private women's college 45 minutes away--the one you chose because you always wanted that life--what's she going to get out of being there when she doesn't want to? She's a lot tougher than you think she is because we raised her right. She can handle this and we need to let her." A few days later, he quietly took the daughter out for pizza. "It's late in the game but get on the phone and see if you can 'sell yourself' to a school in D.C. I'll handle your mother." She sold, he handled, she went and she's now near retirement age and swears it was the undisputed best choice.

Time passed. The girl grew up, the grandmother aged. The blue-eyed charmer retired from an international architect-engineer-construction firm shortly after the daughter's college graduation, but not before she started working there and dropping in to her Daddy's office now and then for breaks and a short chat.

Two years later, on September 27, 1984, he shuffled off this mortal coil and found the peace that eluded him in this life. He got his Catholic funeral (a nice Irish priest probably bent some rules) and is buried in a military cemetery in Southern California. Dressing for the funeral, his wife pulled a veiled chapeau from her closet, looked at her daughter through tears and said "I'm going to wear a hat for your Daddy one last time. He always loved women in suits and hats." Honorary pallbearers were wonderful family friends, the owner of a local Mexican restaurant (sadly, now gone) and his numerous sons, all in those short-sleeved embroidered shirts that might (?) be called guyaberas. They brought color and life to a heartbreaking day. His oldest sister, the last of the family, came from Pennsylvania to help bury her baby brother.

He was not there to walk his daughter down the aisle when she married. He was not part of the rescuing committee when she showed up at the parental house at midnight with a baby on her hip sobbing "My marriage is over." He didn't get to take his wife to London, one of her dearest desires (again, fear not -- she went a few years later and took up residence in Harrods Food Hall indulging the love affair of the century with English Cheddar.) He wasn't there to cheer his favorite nephew through Air Force retirement and a second career as an airline pilot. He didn't get to meet his grandson (though most doubt that he's truly absent from the young man's life). He wasn't around to see his wife through to the end, but that's probably better, as her death would have killed him anyway.

But this man lives on, with the verve and energy he used in his own too-short life. His daughter jokes that as long as there's a breath in her own son's body, her Daddy will never be truly gone. He gave her an insatiable desire to learn, to know things, to understand people, to experience as much of this gorgeous big, beautiful world as she could possibly cram into one lifespan. His fervent Steelers fandom lives on, to the extent that even his baby grandson's first sweatsuit proudly boasted the hypocycloid logo before the kid was out of diapers. "His" red sauce graces most of the family's holiday tables now, and the daughter keeps roughly a gallon of it frozen "just in case."

If you haven't figured it out by now (and you have), I'm honored to tell you our protagonist is my father. And I'd happily give up a kidney to be shopping for one more wallet, one more belt, one more comprehensive account of the history of God-knows-what for his birthday (hardbound, please). I'd pay any price to throw some burgers on the grill and make him the simple birthday dinner he would have asked for. As it is, I will pray for the repose of his soul, send love into the universe, and try to make my Daddy proud on what would have been his 102nd birthday. And I will miss him until my dying day.

Until we meet again, Daddy, Little Sunshine loves you.

The softer side of grief and memory

My dear, precious Mother -- it's been 11 years since we lost you. We get through the days without your soft touch, without your preternaturally beautiful emerald eyes, without your endless reserves of loving patience for your hardheaded "babies." 

You'd be so proud of your "little grandboy." After college, he came home for a bit, bounced around trying to find his path, and finally returned to his beloved Arizona mountains. He's found his love (who reminds us of you in so many ways) -- she's a loving, sweet-hearted girl who's fierce and strong, but also soft and endlessly kind. She really is the daughter I never knew I needed. They are charting their own path, learning every day, and making the life they want. We speak several times a week and see each other when we can.

Our girl graduated from AU and stayed in DC, then went on to get a master's degree in some arcane sub-discipline of defense studies. She's married and living in Stuttgart now. They'll be there for several years, then possibly back stateside. 

The puppy who sat on your lap is an old-lady dog now, but still loves her early-evening zoomies around the back yard. She's spoiled rotten, as this family's dogs all seem to be, but we love our Margaret. And Jennifer has settled into her elder years; you wouldn't believe what a dignified lady our psycho calico kitten has become! Jennifer and I still watch M*A*S*H* reruns in my room, snuggled under that navy-blue snowman blanket you gave me. We feel you there with us, chuckling at Hawkeye and smirking at my crush on Winchester.

Your house, always a haven of warmth and security, is now home to a lovely young family with an energetic toddler. They kept your grapefruit tree (it's enormous now!) and added papaya trees and dragonfruit plants and all kinds of things. I love knowing that someone else is making as loving a nest as you and Daddy did there, and I love hearing the sounds of a happy family from my kitchen.

For years after your funeral, I couldn't get serious about returning to St. Wilfrid's. It just hurt too much. And then there were . . . other things . . . that kept me away. But the warmth and persistence of some of our friends influenced me to go back, and now when I "see you" there, it's reassuring rather than heartbreaking. 

Every day I miss you and find myself wishing I could call and chat (maybe that's what this is?) I miss the "good night" phone calls, I miss buzzing around town with you on Saturdays, I miss giving you grief about your primping. I miss hearing the kitchen door open and knowing you'll soon drop everything and let loose with a loud string of "damnits." (By the way, thanks for teaching my son to swear. Like the rest of us, he can hold his own in the finest waterfront saloons, and like you, I feign shock and horror when I hear it. Is it in the DNA? Law of unintended consequences?) I miss your precision and willingness to decorate my Christmas tree. I miss making that whole damned bird dinner for you every Thanksgiving (although we still do pilgrim casserole). I miss laughing on Christmas Eve when you're still wrapping 11 zillion presents at 9:30 p.m. I miss hiding your keys in my freezer and telling you I have no idea where they are. These things are not inconsequential; they were the fabric of our everyday lives for so long. Losing you has taught me that you don't get past grief; you just learn to live with it. The raggedy edges soften, color creeps back into the world, lightheartedness returns, focus shifts. But you're always there and I always miss you

Loving friends continue to get me through painful days. "Little Jannie" stayed with me all day on the day you died; without her I'd have been a worse floundering mess than I was. Mary, of course, sweet, loyal Mary, was by my side every step of the way. And our Dan, dear precious Daniel, quietly took charge when I couldn't cope for another minute. Your baby girl and little grandboy are in good hands, Mother. 

We know you are living in everlasting light, endless peace and joy, and an eternal lack of pain and unwelcome silence. We know you are fully healed and whole (side note: Mother, I REALLY hope there are no post-stroke rehabs in heaven -- you just go right ahead and be as unyieldingly left-handed as you want, damnit!) 

Until we meet again, we love you, Mother/ Gra'Mommy/Wolfie/Grandma Duch

I never signed up for this

I had an encounter tonight that has changed me, possibly forever. I didn't want the encounter, I'm famously resistant to change, and I'm simultaneously shaken up and profoundly grateful for the experience. 

A community I'm part of works with a larger community to help homeless and underserved neighbors do their laundry. I'm not directly involved, but several of my friends are. This afternoon, I got a request to pitch in because some regular participants couldn't make it, and someone needed a ride to the coin laundry. Internally, I resisted and felt kind of pissy about it -- I had things to do tonight, errands to run, my own life needed some attention. But I told my friend I'd somehow make it work. When I agreed to help, I had no idea why. 

Teri and her son Jake live in a small apartment in the old section of town -- and not the charming part. The coin laundry is six miles from their home.  Why so far, you wonder? It's because the far-away coin laundry is where a bunch of genuinely good people show up to give them soap and quarters for this most basic task. Let that sink in for a minute, please, my friends: THESE PEOPLE CANNOT AFFORD SOAP AND QUARTERS FOR A COIN LAUNDRY, and they don't have the transportation to get there.

Did I know all this stuff before? Of course I "knew." I don't live under a rock. Was I well aware of real poverty in my community, down the street, right here in "my" part of the world? As of 5 o'clock tonight, I would have snarkily assured you I was painfully aware that need is decidedly not a distant, other-continent thing; that it's right here in town, that I and "my kind" are among the luckiest of the lucky. I've been spewing edited versions of Matthew 26:11 my whole life. I honestly thought I knew about need.

Then need itself got into my car, and I realized I knew nothing. Tammy hobbled out on crutches; Jake, I'd guess in his 20s, has speech and other issues that present some pretty severe handicaps. Between the two of them, they had one sad trash bag full of laundry. Off we went, Jake chattering the whole time and Tammy hardly saying a word. The few times she did speak, she seemed soft and defeated. 

The coin laundry was crowded and buzzing with activity; I walked in with them and said howdy to my friends, then told everybody I'd be back in an hour, after a few errands. I got as far as Target to pick up dog food when Tammy called. Her voice shaking, she said "How are we going to get home? I'm scared!" I reminded her that I said I'd be back to take them home, but her voice broke and I said to hell with the errands. On a visceral level I didn't even know I had, I couldn't leave this frightened, tiny, injured woman alone in a skeezy part of downtown Huntington Beach, even though I knew my friends would let her come to no harm. Sooooooo . . . I went zooming back to the coin laundry, went in and said I was back, and she gave me a huge hug. 

On the ride back, I learned Tammy's husband had died in 2019; Jake mentioned it over and over. Tammy remained quiet, even as he begged her to reassure him that she missed his dad also. Finally, he said "I know you miss him too, Ma. It's hard for you to talk about it." When she asked if we could "please, possibly, if it's not too much trouble" stop at a fast-food place, I swerved into the nearest McDonald's and felt a sickening blend of "why the hell are people eating this sh*t," coupled with "yeah, you'd be eating that sh*t too if your life were that brutal." Four Big Macs, three double-doubles, two large fries and two sweet teas later, we were on our way. When we got to their apartment, I helped them get their stuff -- and Tammy's crutches -- out of the car and sent them on their way. 

Watching those two silhouetted figures make their slow way toward the front door, she with her head down in her hooded Mickey and Minnie sweatshirt and he in his "hot blue" sweat outfit, broke me. I'm still shaking and crying. I still don't know what to do with this, but I know God showed up tonight. And I know I'll be back the next time I'm needed. 

Christmas Eve through the lens of memory

 Christmas Eve morning . . . a lifetime ago, every year, a straight-haired little girl was taken on a "very special shopping trip" with her daddy. "You can either get her dressed up like a perfect little black-velvet princess OR you can get us out of the way right now so you'll have time to finish up," Daddy would say to her ever-fussing mother. "I don't see a way for you to have both. She just doesn't need curled hair to go Christmas shopping."

The little girl learned later that the excursion was intended to get them both out of the way so her mother and grandmother could finish putting lights and bows and silver dragees and powdered sugar and tinsel on absolutely everything, but that need not concern us here.

Things were congested -- traffic was heavy, parking lots were largely full, cash lines were long. But anticipatory magic hung in the air, as strains of instrumental Christmas music permeated the atmosphere. After a gentle interrogation about whether the little girl had saved some of her allowance for Christmas-Eve shopping, the daddy usually managed to conjure up a few spare dollars for the little girl to buy a few last-minute gifts for her mother and grandmother.

Overheated indoor malls didn't dominate the retail scene; a few outdoor "shopping centers" ruled the day. And in those days, the gift shops at a local amusement park-cum-boysenberry farm were refined and aimed toward nice, hardworking middle-class people with decent taste. Their merchandise mix ranged from hideous plastic souvenirs to affordable, tasteful accessories. Usually the little girl and her daddy found some pretty earrings or a small porcelain box to give. Most years after the shopping wrapped up, they adjourned to the on-premises chicken dinner restaurant for a quick lunch. Toward the end of lunch (where "end of lunch" = "shared slice of boysenberry pie"), Daddy would consult his Eterna Matic watch and say "Well, Little Sunshine, are we about ready to head home and wrap these things?"

By the time they returned to their modest tract house in a modest suburban town, the mother and grandmother's talents for excess had reached full Christmas flower. Every surface was embellished; every package under the 12-foot tree shone like a beacon of metallic ribbon and sparkly paper; every cookie glistened with gold dragees, cinnamon Red Hot candies and colored sugar; and every pine cone had clearly been attacked by a glitter-spewing heavy weapon. In one bathroom, a lighted plastic Santa face stared eerily down at people who only wanted to perform a necessary function. Some years, the tension between the adult women in the house was palpable and frightening.

The little girl and her father shrewdly adjourned to their rooms so they could wrap the last gifts in peace and silence. Poor Daddy, soon he'd be rescuing nut roll from death by cremation, and the little girl would endure the long, lonnnngggg wait for Christmas Eve dinner (always something with Daddy's red sauce), a reading of "A Visit from St. Nicholas" and family presents. Sometimes the little girl’s aunts called from Pennsylvania to report on how much snow they'd gotten that day. Almost always, "nobody noticed" if the little girl swiped a few sweets from the holly-shaped ceramic plates that adorned every flat surface in the house. (She “accidentally” ate so many chocolate peanut clusters one year that she was almost retirement age before she could look at them without waves of queasiness.)

By the time the gifts were wrapped and it was safe to emerge into the shared areas of the house, the mother and grandmother had set aside their differences and chosen merriment over sulkiness and resentment (one or the other of them usually came to her senses and realized it didn’t REALLY matter if the Styrofoam candle was on the left or the right side of the stuffed Santa doll). Usually, the daddy gave his little girl a conspiratorial wink and said "Aren't you glad we got out of this mess for a few hours?"

While the early hours of the day were frenzied, a heavenly peace did descend on that house in the afternoon and evening. The dinner table was gorgeous, with beautiful linens, plates and glasses; Daddy’s food was flawless; and the conversation was free and happy. Some years, the little girl and her mother went to midnight church services (which began at 10:30 p.m. and the “little girl” still hasn’t figured out why they didn’t just call it the 10:30 service). No matter how tired they were, the last thing before bedtime, the mother and her little girl looked out her bedroom window. Every year – EVERY year – they saw in the distance a miniature sleigh and NINE tiny reindeer.

I wish my Christmas-celebrating friends ALL the magic.

Chance encounter with a lost delivery driver and her bird brightens a cold night

 Well, the universe has once again demonstrated that moments of frustration can turn gorgeous in an instant.

I ordered dinner. Got several text messages that it had been delivered but here I was, still starving. Phone rang, a Chicago number (what the hell?), and of course it was the delivery driver, hopelessly lost IN A SHORT CUL-DE-SAC <cue eyroll>. I offered to go meet her in the driveway and WOW!

On her passenger seat was a birdcage, but the bird (possibly a conure? My knowledge of birds is limited to roasting them.) was out, on top of the cage, perfectly tame and still. The delivery lady started talking a mile a minute, introducing Joy (the bird) and telling me how much she loves him. Then the bird started to squawk and she told me he was telling me he loved me. Then he made other noises and she said those were kisses. I think I blabbered and stammered a bit but the whole thing was slightly overwhelming.

Anyhow, she said "shukra" and I said "shukra." She said "Oh, you speak Arabic?" and I said "the Arabic I just spoke is all the Arabic I know." She then proceeded to tell me she's Palestinian and originally from a town near Nazareth, but "it's all the Holy Land." I said "Yes, sacred ground for three major world religions." She told me to enjoy my "Christ's mass," said "I love you" and drove off. Joy the bird squawked the entire time.

It was just a beautiful, unexpected moment on an ordinary Tuesday and really brightened my evening. I wish Basma and Joy all the, well, joy.

Note to hyperlocal friends: Don't order the roast chicken from Uncle Pete's. It's dry as dust, even the dark meat.

What to get my kids for Christmas?

 Yes, this. All of this. (This is not my original graphic and I don't know whom to credit but it's brilliant.) Can't tell you what a difference books have made in my family's lives. I'm talking (largely) to the parents of younger kids whose families celebrate Christmas.

Hell, I've been Meg, Jo AND Amy (I was never sweet, retiring Beth; I played the piano for 17 years only under duress and guilt). I fell down rabbit holes with Alice; I had a tea party at 17 Cherry Tree Lane; I rambled around the Swiss Alps and helped Grandfather make cheese. I've been Becky Thatcher; I've meandered all over Beacon Hill with Beany, Jack, Dee and Reginald (and if anybody finds a used copy of "Beacon Hill Children," CALL ME IMMEDIATELY.) I fretted with Henry Higgins and his gallons of guppies, and I felt bad for Ellen Tebbets when her undershirt kept slipping under her ballet costume.

My son slew dragons, he was sorted into Gryffindor and became a wicked Quidditch player, he trained redbone coonhounds, he smart-assed back at the half-witted third-grade teacher who told me the Titanic story was "off-limits" to kids his age. (YESSS, we crossed swords on that and YESSS, I won. The only thing worse than a moron is a stubborn moron. The only thing better than a well-read mom is a well-read mom who's willing to draw first blood.) He floated down the Mississippi River with Jim to Cairo; he helped Tom whitewash that fence the day Aunt Polly was in such a temper.

Thanks to books and familial encouragement of a lifelong reading habit, we have been to centuries and continents that will always be inaccessible to us "in real life."

Books change lives. Please, young parents, get your kids books. Get used books and do both your wallet and the planet a favor. Read to them and with them. They'll "have" those books in their souls long after the cheap plastic toys have been shattered, forgotten and cast off into a landfill. Books don't fail you when there's an operating system upgrade or a power outage. Books don't need batteries and "controllers" (whatever the hell those are; and no, don't tell me; I don't want to know) to take you on an adventure. Books are portable. Books are (largely) recyclable. Books are/can be cheap or free (public libraries ABOUND).

You've got a week until Christmas. I BEG you to consider books. I hope YOUR children hear him exclaim as he drives out of sight "Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!"

The quotidian -- way TOO damned quotidian

I imagine those of us who've been around a while are going to remember today in the same way we remember, say, the Kennedy assassinations, the Apollo 8 moon landing, the day Richard Nixon resigned, the day of the Challenger explosion, and so on.

I'm starting to feel like every detail of an otherwise completely unremarkable day is etched into my mind with laserlike precision. Very little -- none -- of it matters but I know what shirt I almost wore before changing my mind, what time my kids called, and a thousand other minuscule, unrelated details. I remember texting a friend that I'd be showing up for dinner in ratty shorts with dirty hair (she didn't care). 

I have a feeling I'll be able to recall that mental clutter with crystal clarity many years from now, if many years are granted to me, in the same way I can still feel my mother pulling me onto the piano bench to tell me about Senator Kennedy's assassination, the way I can eidetically re-create the tears in my father's eyes at Angel stadium when the announcement came that men had landed on the moon, the way I can still see Mother ironing (and smell the steam and the starch!) as we watched Richard Nixon resign, the way my friend Corbett and I were glued to his bootleg TV in our improvised office watching the horrors of the Challenger disaster. 

Is anyone else having this same reaction? Is the marginal minutia of your day searing itself into your mind? Why does this happen? Are we clinging to ordinary, day-in-the-life stuff because we need to -- because the huge stuff is too overwhelming? Are we in a collective state of shock (not surprise, I'm referring to something akin to medical SHOCK, the real stuff).