The names spark no recognition. The faces are those of strangers.
As I peruse the list of Facebook members from my graduating high school class, I’m dismayed at how few I recall.
I now have trouble summoning up the last names of some of my closest high school friends. I lost track of them when I packed my bags and headed for the University of Missouri-Columbia in pursuit of my future. There was no room in my bags for my past. They were too filled with dreams and expectations.
Now, more than 30 years later, I would give anything to open an old suitcase, reach in and share some long-forgotten memories with an old high school friend.
Who was that girl that I skipped school with to go shopping for prom shoes on the day I was inducted into the National Honor Society? To my horror, my parents were present when my name was announced in the auditorium but I was nowhere to be found.
What was the name of the guy I had a crush on in junior high school who complimented me on the mint-green pants suit my mother made for me? I was on Cloud Nine for days.
Who was that boy I used to debate in journalism class. He was a conservative card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association and I was a dyed-in-the-wool pacifist.
Granted, there are people who seem to make and keep connections throughout their lives. Sadly, up until now, I didn’t realize what a treasure friendship was. I didn’t realize that you have to tend to a friendship much the same way you tend a garden. You sow the seeds, cultivate the plants and harvest the fruits of your labor.
But it doesn’t end there. To maintain that garden, or friendship, you begin all over again.
In many ways this eighth-grade class at St. Stephen Catholic School has shared experiences that has brought it closer together than the average class.
You’ve inaugurated a new school and helped prepare a new teacher for a leadership role as an assistant principal and an assistant principal for a leadership role as principal.
You’ve comforted classmates through the deaths of parents as well as grandparents, aunts and other loved ones, and you shared the grief of a beloved music teacher upon the death of his wife.
Afterward, you helped your parents launch a campaign to find a cure for the disease that took the lives of those you loved.
You’ve endured all the psychological trauma of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and come out of it relatively unscathed.
You’ve sadly bid farewell to classmates who moved away or went on to other schools while welcoming new classmates into your close-knit circle.
You shared the spiritual thrill of receiving your first Eucharist together after overcoming the fear of your first reconciliation. And then you were confirmed together as God’s children.
You’ve learned the angst of childhood rivalry on the school playground as your personalities began to develop and too many of you wanted to be leaders, too few followers.
Then you discovered the relief that comes when you realize you can compromise and still be assertive.
You’ve shared the national spotlight with the Tampa Bay Lightning hockey club when the team, under the management of a classmate’s father, won the Stanley Cup.
You’ve experienced pure childhood joy, as well as some stomach upsets, trying out every thrill ride together at the Spring Jubilee while your parents squeezed lemons, sold tickets and fried clams in the food tent.
We’ve watched you mature physically, mentally and spiritually, and I don’t think there is a parent among us who doesn’t feel as if you all are our children. I know I’ve fallen in love with you all.
As I look around at this eighth-grade class and all that you’ve been through together – the victories, the losses, the laughter and the tears – I pray that you’ll hold on to these memories and friendships as tightly as you can. Savor every moment. I promise you won’t regret it 30 years from now.
All my love,
D’Ann White
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Furry friend makes wait tolerable
I have this recurring dream.
Sure, the scenery and people vary some but the theme is always the same.
I’m in the Tampa Tribune newsroom trying to do the only thing I know how to do – write stories based on information I’ve gathered and interviews I’ve conducted.
I’m in ecstasy, knowing that I’m using the gift God gave me just as He planned.
But, inevitably, someone approaches me, usually a trusted friend who I expected to always support me. And this person blows my cover.
“You’re not supposed to be here. You were laid off.”
I wake up sweating and sobbing with the knowledge that my nightmare is real. I’ll never again sit in an office with my fellow reporters and feel the joy of producing copy that will appear in the next day’s newspaper.
I’ve lived through a number of hardships in my lifetime – watching my little brother waste away and die from a cruel disease; a brutal rape at knifepoint by a serial rapist on the campus of the University of Missouri-Columbia; the accidental shooting of my boyfriend by an alcoholic Vietnam vet with post-traumatic stress disorder; acting as the primary caretaker for my sister-in-law as she died a slow, lingering death from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma; the death of my beloved father.
But none of those tragedies had the lingering effect on me as the heartbreak of losing my job. To me, my job was not only part of my identity, it was my purpose. Childhood friends recall me carrying around a reporter’s notebook in grade school, interviewing my classmates. I wanted to be a reporter for as long as I can remember.
The desperate economy combined with the demise of newspapers made finding a new job virtually impossible. Well-meaning friends tried to tell me I needed to find a new career; I needed to reinvent myself. But that’s easier said than done when journalism is all you’ve ever known and done, all I’ve ever wanted to do.
I began applying for any jobs that had the words “reporter,” “editor” or “writer” in the job description. A year later, I’ve applied for 124 jobs and have gotten exactly two face-to-face interviews. My prospects seem gloomy, and I’m rapidly losing hope.
But there’s been one bright spot during these frustrating months.
I became a new mother.
I fell in love with her when I saw her adoption photo and I knew she had to be a part of our family despite the fact that I’d just been laid off and money was tight.
Just 6 months old, she had curly red hair nearly the color of mine and big, coffee-colored eyes that matched my husband’s.
She was the perfect baby, never mind the fact that the curly red hair covered her entire body and she walked on four legs and showed her pleasure by wagging her tail.
I’d always wanted a poodle, and she was available for adoption for the cost of a vet visit and shots.
In the 10 months that she’d been ours, little Mini, short for Mignon, which means “petite” in French, has been my saving grace.
She’s better than Prozac. Just seeing her greet me with her funny little dance is enough to cast me from my doldrums. When the depression hits, she seems to know, curling her little body into mine as I softly cry.
The tears rarely last long. Her antics usually leave me laughing as she grabs her toothbrush and begins brushing her own teeth or teases her older brother, Oliver, the Yorkshire terrier, by stealing away whatever toy with which he happens to be playing.
I can’t help but wonder if this 5-pound puff was heaven-sent specifically to get me through this difficult period of my life.
I know God must have a plan for me. Surely, it’s not my destiny to sit idle when I have so much to give. But it’s nice to know I don’t have to wait all by myself.
Sure, the scenery and people vary some but the theme is always the same.
I’m in the Tampa Tribune newsroom trying to do the only thing I know how to do – write stories based on information I’ve gathered and interviews I’ve conducted.
I’m in ecstasy, knowing that I’m using the gift God gave me just as He planned.
But, inevitably, someone approaches me, usually a trusted friend who I expected to always support me. And this person blows my cover.
“You’re not supposed to be here. You were laid off.”
I wake up sweating and sobbing with the knowledge that my nightmare is real. I’ll never again sit in an office with my fellow reporters and feel the joy of producing copy that will appear in the next day’s newspaper.
I’ve lived through a number of hardships in my lifetime – watching my little brother waste away and die from a cruel disease; a brutal rape at knifepoint by a serial rapist on the campus of the University of Missouri-Columbia; the accidental shooting of my boyfriend by an alcoholic Vietnam vet with post-traumatic stress disorder; acting as the primary caretaker for my sister-in-law as she died a slow, lingering death from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma; the death of my beloved father.
But none of those tragedies had the lingering effect on me as the heartbreak of losing my job. To me, my job was not only part of my identity, it was my purpose. Childhood friends recall me carrying around a reporter’s notebook in grade school, interviewing my classmates. I wanted to be a reporter for as long as I can remember.
The desperate economy combined with the demise of newspapers made finding a new job virtually impossible. Well-meaning friends tried to tell me I needed to find a new career; I needed to reinvent myself. But that’s easier said than done when journalism is all you’ve ever known and done, all I’ve ever wanted to do.
I began applying for any jobs that had the words “reporter,” “editor” or “writer” in the job description. A year later, I’ve applied for 124 jobs and have gotten exactly two face-to-face interviews. My prospects seem gloomy, and I’m rapidly losing hope.
But there’s been one bright spot during these frustrating months.
I became a new mother.
I fell in love with her when I saw her adoption photo and I knew she had to be a part of our family despite the fact that I’d just been laid off and money was tight.
Just 6 months old, she had curly red hair nearly the color of mine and big, coffee-colored eyes that matched my husband’s.
She was the perfect baby, never mind the fact that the curly red hair covered her entire body and she walked on four legs and showed her pleasure by wagging her tail.
I’d always wanted a poodle, and she was available for adoption for the cost of a vet visit and shots.
In the 10 months that she’d been ours, little Mini, short for Mignon, which means “petite” in French, has been my saving grace.
She’s better than Prozac. Just seeing her greet me with her funny little dance is enough to cast me from my doldrums. When the depression hits, she seems to know, curling her little body into mine as I softly cry.
The tears rarely last long. Her antics usually leave me laughing as she grabs her toothbrush and begins brushing her own teeth or teases her older brother, Oliver, the Yorkshire terrier, by stealing away whatever toy with which he happens to be playing.
I can’t help but wonder if this 5-pound puff was heaven-sent specifically to get me through this difficult period of my life.
I know God must have a plan for me. Surely, it’s not my destiny to sit idle when I have so much to give. But it’s nice to know I don’t have to wait all by myself.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Music bridges the generation gap
“Oh, Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz?”
My then-12-year-old son, sister and mom belted out the familiar words to the Janis Joplin tune on the way to my niece’s wedding rehearsal dinner in St. Louis, recalling how it’d once been one of my dad’s favorite songs.
My dad had died the year before, just after Thanksgiving, following a long, lingering bout with cancer. He finally said, “No more.”
No more surgeries. No more hospitals. No more being cared for like a helpless infant. No more pain. He was ready to die.
It was a hard decision for him. He knew my mom didn’t want to let go. She needed him around and she wanted him to fight. But all the fight had been taken out of him. He was tired and I believe he was eager to be with my brother who had died at the age of 14 of complications related to lupus.
Although he’d been raised Catholic, my dad wasn’t a religious man in later life. But he was a good man, a loving man, a man who cared about people. And I’m sure, though he didn’t speak of it, that his belief was strong. I’ve no doubt he earned his place in heaven for his good works and repentance.
So, nearly a year after his death, we piled into the Caddy he once owned to attend the rehearsal dinner. Although she’d given away Dad’s clothes, Mom didn’t have the heart to get rid of Dad’s beloved Cadillac so she’d been driving both her own car and his to keep the engine in working order.
The radio came on when she turned the ignition key and a Rolling Stones tune blasted from the Cadillac’s superior surround-sound speaker system.
“What are you doing listening to the Rolling Stones?” I asked my mom over Mick Jagger’s lyrics to “Beast of Burden.”
“Oh, this is your father’s radio station,” she answered matter-of-factly. “I just never bothered to change it.”
“Dad listened to rock music?” I asked.
“Sure,” replied my mom. “He loved rock music. “Especially that Sting guy.”
I was momentarily taken aback, remembering the man who had ordered us to turn down our “confounded stereo” when we were playing Led Zepplin or Jethro Tull too loud back in the ‘70s. His car was tuned into a station where Led Zepplin tunes were considered tame.
My sister reminded me that Dad wasn’t entirely “un-hip” when we were growing up. After all, he did like to sing Janis Joplin’s Mercedes Benz song.
That led to the impromptu serenade by three generations. My son was familiar with it because it was a song I’d used as a lullaby to lull him to sleep when he was a baby.
Now that son not only knows all the words to the song but can play it on the guitar.
As I was listening to him play the familiar tune as well as others that I grew up with, I couldn’t help but marvel at the way music has bridged the generations.
It’s hard to believe there was a time when the world feared the rock revolution would tear the generations apart, that the Beatles would cause some kind of permanent rift between father and son.
Now “Hey, Jude” and “Eleanor Rigby” are mainstream music in elevators.
What other social changes do we needlessly fear?
My then-12-year-old son, sister and mom belted out the familiar words to the Janis Joplin tune on the way to my niece’s wedding rehearsal dinner in St. Louis, recalling how it’d once been one of my dad’s favorite songs.
My dad had died the year before, just after Thanksgiving, following a long, lingering bout with cancer. He finally said, “No more.”
No more surgeries. No more hospitals. No more being cared for like a helpless infant. No more pain. He was ready to die.
It was a hard decision for him. He knew my mom didn’t want to let go. She needed him around and she wanted him to fight. But all the fight had been taken out of him. He was tired and I believe he was eager to be with my brother who had died at the age of 14 of complications related to lupus.
Although he’d been raised Catholic, my dad wasn’t a religious man in later life. But he was a good man, a loving man, a man who cared about people. And I’m sure, though he didn’t speak of it, that his belief was strong. I’ve no doubt he earned his place in heaven for his good works and repentance.
So, nearly a year after his death, we piled into the Caddy he once owned to attend the rehearsal dinner. Although she’d given away Dad’s clothes, Mom didn’t have the heart to get rid of Dad’s beloved Cadillac so she’d been driving both her own car and his to keep the engine in working order.
The radio came on when she turned the ignition key and a Rolling Stones tune blasted from the Cadillac’s superior surround-sound speaker system.
“What are you doing listening to the Rolling Stones?” I asked my mom over Mick Jagger’s lyrics to “Beast of Burden.”
“Oh, this is your father’s radio station,” she answered matter-of-factly. “I just never bothered to change it.”
“Dad listened to rock music?” I asked.
“Sure,” replied my mom. “He loved rock music. “Especially that Sting guy.”
I was momentarily taken aback, remembering the man who had ordered us to turn down our “confounded stereo” when we were playing Led Zepplin or Jethro Tull too loud back in the ‘70s. His car was tuned into a station where Led Zepplin tunes were considered tame.
My sister reminded me that Dad wasn’t entirely “un-hip” when we were growing up. After all, he did like to sing Janis Joplin’s Mercedes Benz song.
That led to the impromptu serenade by three generations. My son was familiar with it because it was a song I’d used as a lullaby to lull him to sleep when he was a baby.
Now that son not only knows all the words to the song but can play it on the guitar.
As I was listening to him play the familiar tune as well as others that I grew up with, I couldn’t help but marvel at the way music has bridged the generations.
It’s hard to believe there was a time when the world feared the rock revolution would tear the generations apart, that the Beatles would cause some kind of permanent rift between father and son.
Now “Hey, Jude” and “Eleanor Rigby” are mainstream music in elevators.
What other social changes do we needlessly fear?
Friday, January 22, 2010
Memorable moments
The fifth-graders were performing the Stations of the Cross during Lent. Ted Jarzynski was a Roman soldier and Corey Cannon was Jesus. Corey wasn’t taking his role seriously. Instead of acting like a man who’d been betrayed by his people, he was joking around.
Ted, wearing a plastic centurion helmet, got fed up.
“If you don’t cut it out, Corey, you’re going down a fourth time, and this time you’re not getting up.”
Ted, wearing a plastic centurion helmet, got fed up.
“If you don’t cut it out, Corey, you’re going down a fourth time, and this time you’re not getting up.”
Friday, January 15, 2010
Memorable moments come at unexpected times
As far as my 14-year-old son is concerned, my layoff didn’t represent the loss of a paycheck, the chance to get some really awesome birthday and Christmas gifts or the opportunity for vacations to exotic locales.
Nope, mom losing her job meant he didn’t have to spend unbearably boring hours in after-care waiting for 5:30 p.m. to roll around. Instead, he could be among the privileged majority whose moms picked them up as soon as school was over.
Now his mom could ACTUALLY be there to see him languish on the bench during the flag football games because he, unfortunately, inherited her athletic disabilities.
“I’m so sorry,” apologized the coach, seeing me hug my son after the game, and mistaking it as sympathy. “I got caught up in the excitement and forgot to put him in the game. I’m not the type of coach that cares about wins. I want everyone to have a good time.”
“It’s OK,” I assure him. “Ian’s just here for the exercise and to root his teammates on. It doesn’t really matter to him.”
And it doesn’t. He’s there for the camaraderie, something he’s been missing with his mom who spent way too many hours working.
My layoff was a chance for us to renew our relationship and discover that we didn’t simply love one another, we actually liked each other.
It should have been one of those days you just want to be done with as soon as possible. We had a big list of obligations and none of them spelled F-U-N.
We were up early to work the St. Stephen Catholic School concession stand for the i9 Sports teams, which means selling candy, hot dogs, water, Gatorade, coffee and chips to players and their parents for four hours on a Saturday morning. I brought the newspaper with me to read in between customers, and it happened to have the Macy’s ad supplement with the perfume samples inside. Ian and I decided to test them out, rubbing the samples on one another and then sniffing to see if they met our approval. I had just rubbed a Dolce & Gabana sample on the back of my jeans, leaned over and suggested he “smell my butt,” when, to my embarrassment, a gentleman walked up to purchase a cup of coffee.
Ian burst into a fit of hysterics. “Sorry,” he apologized to the stranger, explaining, “She always has me check her butt for odors as a precaution.”
We high-tailed it out of there as soon as the sports teams were finished to do some Christmas shopping.
“Turn this song up,” I told him as we drove along. “I love this song.”
The song was “Little Drummer Boy,” sung by Pat Boone. Ian turned the volume up to maximum, rolled down the windows, donned some my Jackie Onassis-style sunglasses and started singing along at the top of his lungs. I thought, what the heck, and joined him. People in the cars around us soon got into the spirit of the occasion and began singing along. Pretty soon there was a chorus of “Little Drummer Boy” and heads bobbing to “rum pum pum pum” along Bloomingdale Avenue.
As we continued driving to the store, he received a text message from a friend who ended the conversation with the familiar “LOL.” I confided in him that I used to think “LOL” stood for “Lots of love.” I was embarrassed when I later found out it meant “Laugh out loud.” When we arrived at the store, he had no qualms about revealing my secret to the cashier.
“Can you just see her sending a sympathy message to a friend? So sorry your dad died. LOL.” The cashier laughed so hard, she could barely ring us up.
Pulling into the driveway that evening after a long day of errands, Ian surprised me by saying, “Thanks, Mom. It was really a fun day.”
“What do you mean?” I asked him. “We didn’t do anything special.”
“Yeah, but we had fun anyway.”
Nope, mom losing her job meant he didn’t have to spend unbearably boring hours in after-care waiting for 5:30 p.m. to roll around. Instead, he could be among the privileged majority whose moms picked them up as soon as school was over.
Now his mom could ACTUALLY be there to see him languish on the bench during the flag football games because he, unfortunately, inherited her athletic disabilities.
“I’m so sorry,” apologized the coach, seeing me hug my son after the game, and mistaking it as sympathy. “I got caught up in the excitement and forgot to put him in the game. I’m not the type of coach that cares about wins. I want everyone to have a good time.”
“It’s OK,” I assure him. “Ian’s just here for the exercise and to root his teammates on. It doesn’t really matter to him.”
And it doesn’t. He’s there for the camaraderie, something he’s been missing with his mom who spent way too many hours working.
My layoff was a chance for us to renew our relationship and discover that we didn’t simply love one another, we actually liked each other.
It should have been one of those days you just want to be done with as soon as possible. We had a big list of obligations and none of them spelled F-U-N.
We were up early to work the St. Stephen Catholic School concession stand for the i9 Sports teams, which means selling candy, hot dogs, water, Gatorade, coffee and chips to players and their parents for four hours on a Saturday morning. I brought the newspaper with me to read in between customers, and it happened to have the Macy’s ad supplement with the perfume samples inside. Ian and I decided to test them out, rubbing the samples on one another and then sniffing to see if they met our approval. I had just rubbed a Dolce & Gabana sample on the back of my jeans, leaned over and suggested he “smell my butt,” when, to my embarrassment, a gentleman walked up to purchase a cup of coffee.
Ian burst into a fit of hysterics. “Sorry,” he apologized to the stranger, explaining, “She always has me check her butt for odors as a precaution.”
We high-tailed it out of there as soon as the sports teams were finished to do some Christmas shopping.
“Turn this song up,” I told him as we drove along. “I love this song.”
The song was “Little Drummer Boy,” sung by Pat Boone. Ian turned the volume up to maximum, rolled down the windows, donned some my Jackie Onassis-style sunglasses and started singing along at the top of his lungs. I thought, what the heck, and joined him. People in the cars around us soon got into the spirit of the occasion and began singing along. Pretty soon there was a chorus of “Little Drummer Boy” and heads bobbing to “rum pum pum pum” along Bloomingdale Avenue.
As we continued driving to the store, he received a text message from a friend who ended the conversation with the familiar “LOL.” I confided in him that I used to think “LOL” stood for “Lots of love.” I was embarrassed when I later found out it meant “Laugh out loud.” When we arrived at the store, he had no qualms about revealing my secret to the cashier.
“Can you just see her sending a sympathy message to a friend? So sorry your dad died. LOL.” The cashier laughed so hard, she could barely ring us up.
Pulling into the driveway that evening after a long day of errands, Ian surprised me by saying, “Thanks, Mom. It was really a fun day.”
“What do you mean?” I asked him. “We didn’t do anything special.”
“Yeah, but we had fun anyway.”
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Finding My Purpose
Romans 12:12 Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.
By D’Ann White
Managing to arouse myself from the fog I’d been immersed in for several weeks, I noticed that my 13-year-old son, Ian, was playing his electric guitar.
“Shouldn’t you be reading the books on your summer reading list?” I yelled in an effort to be heard over the amplifiers.
He turned down the amps and shrugged.
“What’s the point?” he asked.
“What do you mean by that?” I asked.
“Well, you were an A student, on the honor roll, the National Honor Society. You did everything you were supposed to and look where it got you.”
Hmm. I could see his point. After nearly 25 years with the company, The Tampa Tribune laid me off in May.
As far as Ian was concerned, I was living proof that there is no reward for hard work, dedication and loyalty.
As an estimated 400 St. Stephen parishioners who have lost jobs over the past couple of years can attest, shock and grief doesn’t begin to describe what I was feeling.
Intellectually, I understood that it’s a lousy economy, that I wasn’t the only one to lose my job and that it wasn’t a reflection on me or my work.
But emotionally, I wondered why the powers-that-be chose me and not the co-worker who didn’t have as much experience or didn’t write as many stories. What did I do wrong?
On top of all these doubts, I was consumed by guilt.
I carried all the health and life insurance for the family. Now what would we do?
I wondered if this was perhaps God’s punishment for my selfishness. You see, being a journalist wasn’t simply a career for me. I felt it was a calling. I truly believed that I could help and inspire others with my words, that I could make a difference in the world.
I could conceive of no reason God would allow my career to be taken away except He felt I wasn’t using my gifts to glorify and serve Him; I was using them to serve myself.
After the layoff, I couldn’t attend Mass. I couldn’t accept the Holy Eucharist. I felt as if I’d let God down and I was no longer welcome in His House.
Friends tried to reassure me. They would tell me that God has greater plans for me. But, no, that didn’t seem right. Something told me my layoff was God’s way of keeping me humble, of reminding me that, at the end of the day, what I do for a living isn’t all that important.
So, if what we do in life isn’t important, what is?
Surely God didn’t intend to give my son the message that hard work, loyalty and dedication are misguided virtues.
Then it occurred to me, perhaps that’s the problem. We all expect to be rewarded for hard work, loyalty and dedication.
But God never promised us riches, happiness, admiration, the love of others, health or any other rewards on earth. He only promised us rewards in heaven.
Remember, La Immaculata Concepcion reiterated this to Saint Bernadette in the grotto at Lourdes, saying, “I cannot promise to make you happy in this world, only in the next.”
As individuals, we are here for such a short time and, for the most part, our contributions are nebulous, quickly forgotten. A person isn’t measured by his fleeting accomplishments or successes.
Instead, as the saints show us, we are measured by our faith.
That faith gives us the ability to overcome adversity, to tackle innumerable challenges and emerge with our devotion intact.
That faith gives us the ability to know that, no matter what obstacles are put in our path; God will never desert us as long as our belief remains strong.
That faith gives us the ability to carry on and continue serving Him without expecting glory for ourselves here on earth.
That faith gives us the moral rectitude to accept life’s inequities without becoming bitter.
That faith allows us to strive for sanctity knowing that we’re imperfect and will have to forgive ourselves for our setbacks.
It took two months of prayer and soul-searching, but I finally had my reply to Ian’s comments.
I told him we must strive to be our best, to use our God-given gifts to serve Him not for how it will benefit us but for how it will benefit others.
Even if no one remembers what we did to serve God, the fact that we served God with passion, that we glorified Him in the way we knew best, is enough to give our lives meaning.
“So don’t you dare use my layoff as an excuse to be a slacker,” I warned him.
By D’Ann White
Managing to arouse myself from the fog I’d been immersed in for several weeks, I noticed that my 13-year-old son, Ian, was playing his electric guitar.
“Shouldn’t you be reading the books on your summer reading list?” I yelled in an effort to be heard over the amplifiers.
He turned down the amps and shrugged.
“What’s the point?” he asked.
“What do you mean by that?” I asked.
“Well, you were an A student, on the honor roll, the National Honor Society. You did everything you were supposed to and look where it got you.”
Hmm. I could see his point. After nearly 25 years with the company, The Tampa Tribune laid me off in May.
As far as Ian was concerned, I was living proof that there is no reward for hard work, dedication and loyalty.
As an estimated 400 St. Stephen parishioners who have lost jobs over the past couple of years can attest, shock and grief doesn’t begin to describe what I was feeling.
Intellectually, I understood that it’s a lousy economy, that I wasn’t the only one to lose my job and that it wasn’t a reflection on me or my work.
But emotionally, I wondered why the powers-that-be chose me and not the co-worker who didn’t have as much experience or didn’t write as many stories. What did I do wrong?
On top of all these doubts, I was consumed by guilt.
I carried all the health and life insurance for the family. Now what would we do?
I wondered if this was perhaps God’s punishment for my selfishness. You see, being a journalist wasn’t simply a career for me. I felt it was a calling. I truly believed that I could help and inspire others with my words, that I could make a difference in the world.
I could conceive of no reason God would allow my career to be taken away except He felt I wasn’t using my gifts to glorify and serve Him; I was using them to serve myself.
After the layoff, I couldn’t attend Mass. I couldn’t accept the Holy Eucharist. I felt as if I’d let God down and I was no longer welcome in His House.
Friends tried to reassure me. They would tell me that God has greater plans for me. But, no, that didn’t seem right. Something told me my layoff was God’s way of keeping me humble, of reminding me that, at the end of the day, what I do for a living isn’t all that important.
So, if what we do in life isn’t important, what is?
Surely God didn’t intend to give my son the message that hard work, loyalty and dedication are misguided virtues.
Then it occurred to me, perhaps that’s the problem. We all expect to be rewarded for hard work, loyalty and dedication.
But God never promised us riches, happiness, admiration, the love of others, health or any other rewards on earth. He only promised us rewards in heaven.
Remember, La Immaculata Concepcion reiterated this to Saint Bernadette in the grotto at Lourdes, saying, “I cannot promise to make you happy in this world, only in the next.”
As individuals, we are here for such a short time and, for the most part, our contributions are nebulous, quickly forgotten. A person isn’t measured by his fleeting accomplishments or successes.
Instead, as the saints show us, we are measured by our faith.
That faith gives us the ability to overcome adversity, to tackle innumerable challenges and emerge with our devotion intact.
That faith gives us the ability to know that, no matter what obstacles are put in our path; God will never desert us as long as our belief remains strong.
That faith gives us the ability to carry on and continue serving Him without expecting glory for ourselves here on earth.
That faith gives us the moral rectitude to accept life’s inequities without becoming bitter.
That faith allows us to strive for sanctity knowing that we’re imperfect and will have to forgive ourselves for our setbacks.
It took two months of prayer and soul-searching, but I finally had my reply to Ian’s comments.
I told him we must strive to be our best, to use our God-given gifts to serve Him not for how it will benefit us but for how it will benefit others.
Even if no one remembers what we did to serve God, the fact that we served God with passion, that we glorified Him in the way we knew best, is enough to give our lives meaning.
“So don’t you dare use my layoff as an excuse to be a slacker,” I warned him.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Don't Look For My Christmas Card
I wrote this column a few years ago but it was nice to see that certain things don’t change. Once again this year, Lenny was the first on the block to brave the dust and daddy longlegs in the attic and pull out the Christmas decorations.
This time he started the day before Thanksgiving, getting a head start on the entire neighborhood and earning scowls from all the husbands around them who weren’t looking forward to hearing their wives harangue them about spending their Thanksgiving weekend decorating the house.
I drove up just as Lenny was putting the finishing touches on his holiday outdoor artistry, which included a lighted plastic rendition of the Holy Family. A faithful Catholic, Lenny still believes Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Christ, and his decorations reflect that belief.
In my column a few years ago, I related his frustrations with a nonworking lighted “Merry Christmas” sign. Lenny continues to search for a working sign that proclaims “Merry Christmas,” but said he has yet to find one.
“If you see one, buy it and I’ll pay you back,” he told me, earnestly.
I laughed and reminded him of the column I wrote about his “Merry Christmas” sign. I then threatened to revive the column on my blog.
So, here it is:
Yarissa and Lenny were the first people on our street to put up their Christmas decorations.
Lenny began stringing lights as soon as his turkey and dressing digested. I told Yari she was making us all look bad but she explained it was out of necessity.
Lenny’s a Black Hawk helicopter pilot and was going to be gone for most of the month of December. If the lights weren’t put up now, she said, they never would be.
While Lenny put the finishing touches on his front-yard extravaganza, Yari and I headed to church for the first rehearsal of the Christmas pageant featuring the traditional nativity story starring the parish’s 5- to 10-year-olds.
I was assigned the unenviable, um, I mean coveted, task of directing the 4:30 Christmas Eve pageant. That’s typically the family Mass and, as predicted, dozens of would-be Josephs, Marys, innkeepers and shepherds lined up to be in the pageant, including Yari and Lenny’s two young daughters, Natasha and Alexandra. Both girls originally wanted to be angels but Alexandra, the youngest of the two, changed her mind at the last minute and opted to be a shepherdess.
Talent isn’t a factor when it comes to our pageant. Children are chosen for the roles based on who selects the number closest to what some adult is thinking. If we get lucky and the kid happens to have some acting skills, so much the better. However, I was prepared to accept the fact that my directing skills would be limited to reminding Mary not to hold Baby Jesus upside-down and prompting the innkeeper to remove his hand from his wee-wee long enough to point Mary and Joseph to the stable.
With about 40 children, including a barn full of pigs, sheep and cows, on board for the pageant, I returned home, anxious to see Leonardo’s handiwork. He’d taken Natasha to figure-skating lessons and Yari and Alexandra were excitedly awaiting the moment when darkness fell and the automatic timers took over, painting their front yard in glorious Christmas splendor.
Dismayed that the trend was to remove “Christmas” from what was essentially the Christmas season for the sake of political correctness, Yari was especially proud of her giant lighted sign that read “Merry Christmas.”
However, when night fell, the effect wasn’t quite what she was hoping for. Instead of remaining lit, all the lights were set on an intermittent cycle. You’d just spot poor Rudolph and his fellow reindeer in the front yard, and suddenly they’d disappear into a miasma of darkness.
But, for Yari, the biggest affront was her “Merry Christmas” sign. Two of the letters weren’t working so the sign read “Merry Chris as.”
“Merry Chris..as!” she protested. “That’s not the statement I wanted to make to the neighborhood.”
It looked like poor Lenny had more work ahead of him.
In the meantime, I hadn’t begun decorating, shopping or even thinking about decorating or shopping. It looked as if Christmas would come and go before my tree had a single ornament. I glanced at the Sunday fliers and was dismayed to see them advertising last-minute gifts.
The anxiety welled up and I couldn’t contain my tears of frustration at a gathering of friends that afternoon.
It turns out, I wasn’t alone. Far from it.
As far as my friends, Amy and Ivette, were concerned, I was way ahead of the game. You see, I already had a costume for my son for Tuesday’s school Christmas program. The theme was holidays around the world and my son’s teacher suggested I use the same costume I made for his All Saint’s Day report in November.
He did his report on Saint Isidore, patron saint of farmers and farm workers, an Italian saint who lived in the 1600s. I had no idea what an Italian farmer in the 1600s looked like and I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. I stopped by the party store and bought a long, gray beard (all male saints have beards, right?) and then on to Wal-Mart where I picked up some colorful striped discount fabric that I turned into a vest and scarf. A baggy pair of black sweatpants completed the look. As I was walking to the checkout, I saw some corduroy peasant-type hats discounted for a couple of bucks and the look was ideal for an Italian saint.
My son was delighted. The next morning he eagerly donned his costume and, voila! He looked exactly like Fidel Castro.
When my son’s teacher suggested he wear the same costume for the Christmas program, I thought she was joking.
“You want Fidel Castro in the Christmas program?” I asked her.
“Well,” she said. “You can leave off the beard. The rest is perfect.”
My friend Amy was envious. She doesn’t sew and her youngest son needed a shepherd’s costume. She bound his entire costume with iron-on tape and asked us to pray the costume wouldn’t fall apart the moment he walked onto the stage.
Ivette didn’t even know her son needed a costume. She found out Sunday, two days before the event.
As for decorating, my friend Mary assured me she won’t be winning any House Beautiful awards this year. Her son declared their Christmas decorations “the lamest in the neighborhood. Our reindeer’s butt doesn’t even light up anymore.”
My friend Lisa said she put up about half of her decorations and left the rest of the boxes in the family room, hoping she’d find time to complete the task. When she never found the time, she moved the rest of the boxes to the garage. No one ever suspected she didn’t finish decorating.
“I guess that tells you I didn’t need them in the first place,” she said.
At that moment I realized I had two choices.
I could be at home by myself decorating my Christmas tree or out shopping for gifts for the very friends who now surrounded me.
Or I could be with those friends, sharing moments like this -- frustrations, tears, laughter, comfort, joy, and the true meaning of Christmas.
This time he started the day before Thanksgiving, getting a head start on the entire neighborhood and earning scowls from all the husbands around them who weren’t looking forward to hearing their wives harangue them about spending their Thanksgiving weekend decorating the house.
I drove up just as Lenny was putting the finishing touches on his holiday outdoor artistry, which included a lighted plastic rendition of the Holy Family. A faithful Catholic, Lenny still believes Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Christ, and his decorations reflect that belief.
In my column a few years ago, I related his frustrations with a nonworking lighted “Merry Christmas” sign. Lenny continues to search for a working sign that proclaims “Merry Christmas,” but said he has yet to find one.
“If you see one, buy it and I’ll pay you back,” he told me, earnestly.
I laughed and reminded him of the column I wrote about his “Merry Christmas” sign. I then threatened to revive the column on my blog.
So, here it is:
Yarissa and Lenny were the first people on our street to put up their Christmas decorations.
Lenny began stringing lights as soon as his turkey and dressing digested. I told Yari she was making us all look bad but she explained it was out of necessity.
Lenny’s a Black Hawk helicopter pilot and was going to be gone for most of the month of December. If the lights weren’t put up now, she said, they never would be.
While Lenny put the finishing touches on his front-yard extravaganza, Yari and I headed to church for the first rehearsal of the Christmas pageant featuring the traditional nativity story starring the parish’s 5- to 10-year-olds.
I was assigned the unenviable, um, I mean coveted, task of directing the 4:30 Christmas Eve pageant. That’s typically the family Mass and, as predicted, dozens of would-be Josephs, Marys, innkeepers and shepherds lined up to be in the pageant, including Yari and Lenny’s two young daughters, Natasha and Alexandra. Both girls originally wanted to be angels but Alexandra, the youngest of the two, changed her mind at the last minute and opted to be a shepherdess.
Talent isn’t a factor when it comes to our pageant. Children are chosen for the roles based on who selects the number closest to what some adult is thinking. If we get lucky and the kid happens to have some acting skills, so much the better. However, I was prepared to accept the fact that my directing skills would be limited to reminding Mary not to hold Baby Jesus upside-down and prompting the innkeeper to remove his hand from his wee-wee long enough to point Mary and Joseph to the stable.
With about 40 children, including a barn full of pigs, sheep and cows, on board for the pageant, I returned home, anxious to see Leonardo’s handiwork. He’d taken Natasha to figure-skating lessons and Yari and Alexandra were excitedly awaiting the moment when darkness fell and the automatic timers took over, painting their front yard in glorious Christmas splendor.
Dismayed that the trend was to remove “Christmas” from what was essentially the Christmas season for the sake of political correctness, Yari was especially proud of her giant lighted sign that read “Merry Christmas.”
However, when night fell, the effect wasn’t quite what she was hoping for. Instead of remaining lit, all the lights were set on an intermittent cycle. You’d just spot poor Rudolph and his fellow reindeer in the front yard, and suddenly they’d disappear into a miasma of darkness.
But, for Yari, the biggest affront was her “Merry Christmas” sign. Two of the letters weren’t working so the sign read “Merry Chris as.”
“Merry Chris..as!” she protested. “That’s not the statement I wanted to make to the neighborhood.”
It looked like poor Lenny had more work ahead of him.
In the meantime, I hadn’t begun decorating, shopping or even thinking about decorating or shopping. It looked as if Christmas would come and go before my tree had a single ornament. I glanced at the Sunday fliers and was dismayed to see them advertising last-minute gifts.
The anxiety welled up and I couldn’t contain my tears of frustration at a gathering of friends that afternoon.
It turns out, I wasn’t alone. Far from it.
As far as my friends, Amy and Ivette, were concerned, I was way ahead of the game. You see, I already had a costume for my son for Tuesday’s school Christmas program. The theme was holidays around the world and my son’s teacher suggested I use the same costume I made for his All Saint’s Day report in November.
He did his report on Saint Isidore, patron saint of farmers and farm workers, an Italian saint who lived in the 1600s. I had no idea what an Italian farmer in the 1600s looked like and I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. I stopped by the party store and bought a long, gray beard (all male saints have beards, right?) and then on to Wal-Mart where I picked up some colorful striped discount fabric that I turned into a vest and scarf. A baggy pair of black sweatpants completed the look. As I was walking to the checkout, I saw some corduroy peasant-type hats discounted for a couple of bucks and the look was ideal for an Italian saint.
My son was delighted. The next morning he eagerly donned his costume and, voila! He looked exactly like Fidel Castro.
When my son’s teacher suggested he wear the same costume for the Christmas program, I thought she was joking.
“You want Fidel Castro in the Christmas program?” I asked her.
“Well,” she said. “You can leave off the beard. The rest is perfect.”
My friend Amy was envious. She doesn’t sew and her youngest son needed a shepherd’s costume. She bound his entire costume with iron-on tape and asked us to pray the costume wouldn’t fall apart the moment he walked onto the stage.
Ivette didn’t even know her son needed a costume. She found out Sunday, two days before the event.
As for decorating, my friend Mary assured me she won’t be winning any House Beautiful awards this year. Her son declared their Christmas decorations “the lamest in the neighborhood. Our reindeer’s butt doesn’t even light up anymore.”
My friend Lisa said she put up about half of her decorations and left the rest of the boxes in the family room, hoping she’d find time to complete the task. When she never found the time, she moved the rest of the boxes to the garage. No one ever suspected she didn’t finish decorating.
“I guess that tells you I didn’t need them in the first place,” she said.
At that moment I realized I had two choices.
I could be at home by myself decorating my Christmas tree or out shopping for gifts for the very friends who now surrounded me.
Or I could be with those friends, sharing moments like this -- frustrations, tears, laughter, comfort, joy, and the true meaning of Christmas.
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