LEVEL STRETCHES

Ebb and flow.

Fits and spurts.

Ups and downs.

Life is not intended to be consistent.

I have accepted this.

For a while, the pace at which I journeyed on my path would have the sort of predictable changes one would experience on a bicycle ride in New England. Looking ahead, a looming hill would allow for the preparation that the next stretch would be difficult and that momentum gained eased the struggle. Coming down the other side would require holding steady with the wind whipping my hair and gravel kicking up behind the tires; applying just enough brake to stay safe; eyes focused on the path rather than my surroundings.

Inevitably, living in New England, level stretches connect the hard pumping struggles and wind whipping rushes, allowing for a bit of coasting and the kind of leisure that allows me to breathe in the trees and whistle with the birds; absorbing the beauty surrounding the path.

Level stretches are where relationships flourish and ideas are born. Coasting allows for conversations with God and for contemplation to run free. Level stretches are where words find their way from racing thought to fingertips, zipping across invisible netting from coast to coast, blog to blog, screen to screen.

I love the level stretches.

I seem to have lost my way.

I do not recognize my path now.

The peaks and valleys are one after another, back to back, hill upon hill and I crave a long, flat, monotonous path to coast for a while.

Perhaps this is how the middle of life is.

Leaving behind the ease of predicable little children and reliable routines, racing day after day to keep up with work and schedules and deadlines, slipping in just under the wire again and again. Handing over car keys and trust all at once to the children whose lives are pulling them to separate. Check, check, checking off days on the calendar at a pace as rapid as eyelid flutter.

Maybe over the crest of the next hill it will come again; level ground for coasting.

I am ready.

WITNESSING GRACE

The children gather noisily in the parish hall, waiting to make their surprise entrance into church. It is the second to last service for Father Hank and they have collected books to donate in his name to the Read to Grow program; he is unaware. He pops out from behind the Alter during the offertory hymn to see where the children are; he wants them up on the Alter for communion and he is reassured that they are coming.

In classic Trinity fashion, they are announced and make their way to the Alter, loose ends dragging everywhere. They are holding hand made cards and books, some yelling “Hi” to family members…”I’m up here, Mom!” A little girl bellows. They are not intimidated to approach the Alter, as I was in childhood; it is familiar territory to them. Hank gathers them close on Baptisms, Christmas Eve and here and there on a random or unknowingly meaningful Sundays to serve as Assistant Ministers.

As the group, ranging in age from one to thirteen, make their way toward him, he coaxes them all up beyond the Alter rail to stand with him in this Holy, Sacred space. “Come on up everyone, there’s plenty of room.” He smiles as they gather in number.

An announcement is made that the books have been collected by the children in his honor. “We know Father Hank loves books, even though most of the adults were hoping to give him live fish.” The parish applauds and chuckles. Each and every Christmas Eve when the children retell the story of the birth of Jesus, Hank preaches to them, as they sit gathered at his feet. On his first Christmas Eve with us, he talked about Jesus and his followers and how they had a secret code to say that they were Christians; the early Christian symbol of a fish. “I was wondering…. since it is Christmas and I want to give my friends a special gift, what I could give them to help them to remember Jesus” and of course, out came large cardboard boxes that contained Beta fish, complete with bowl and food; one for each and every child present.

We had three kids at the service.

We had two Beta fish at home already.

The following year it was Hermit Crabs, each in a small plastic aquarium with crab food and we worried that he would eventually work his way up to farm animals.

The children spread around the Alter like the smile on Hank’s face, some tugging on the linen and others rubbing fingers on the candelabra. “Father Hank…Hi!” A squirmy little girl said. “Hi” he beamed back. They continued to fill the corners as Hank flashed the sign language for “I love you” to them and they signed back; a symbol he taught them and used often. When he is sure he has everyone in place, he speaks to them. Deviating slightly from the liturgy, he explains to them about the last day Jesus had supper with his friends.

“We use this host, but Jesus took a loaf of bread and he broke it and told his friends that it was his body that would be broken for them. Now they didn’t really understand what he meant and we don’t really understand fully either. And then, because they had wine with supper, he took the cup of wine and told them this was his blood and again, they didn’t really understand.”

Hank paused, his small audience captivated. I kneel at the alter rail only a few feet away and wait for him to continue. He looks as if he is elsewhere and the pause lingers. I wonder if he has forgotten his place, thrown off-course by the little heads gathered by his knees or if he is caught up in emotion. With a visible shift, he returns, face flushed and looks out at the congregation. His eyes showing straight to his soul, he smiles and he says, “I just got a message from my good friend, Jesus. He said, ‘Now you’re catching on, Hank.’”

He continues with the story about how Jesus’ friends asked him how they should pray. “So he told his friends, well this prayer would be good.” The organ plays and voices lift the Lord’s prayer, little ones included. I struggle to sing passed the lump in my throat and Hank continues…

“…In unity, that means all together, in constancy, which is like steady as she goes, and most importantly… and this is what Jesus wants you to know most of all, in peace. And on the last day, bring us to your eternal kingdom, that’s Heaven; all this and so much more we ask in Jesus name.” He tells the children.

“These are the gifts of God for the people of God…that’s you,” he continues, as he holds up the bread. He stops and looks at them.

“Jesus loves you more than anything.” He says, as they nod. “I love you the whole world but Jesus, even more than that!” He says, connecting with each of them.

He moves carefully around and between the little people “The body of your friend, Jesus.” He tells them. They depart one by one and I am in awe of lesson they are receiving. As a young child, I was taught that the Alter was taboo, forbidden, reserved for only Holy men; that the average person was not worthy to be so close to God in the sacredness of this Holy place.

I think back to a sermon long ago when Hank described Jesus’ relationship with children. Jesus asked that the children be brought to him and he welcomed them with open arms. This does not seem foreign to us, but as Hank put it, in His time ‘these were not your little Gap kids, all clean and cute.’ Children in those days were less than second class citizens and were unworthy and unimportant.

Hank has taught our children that each and every one of us is worthy in God’s eyes and Hank places himself no higher or spiritually greater than the sticky little fingers that tug on his robe.

To watch him today was to truly witness God’s Grace.

FAREWELL TO FATHER HANK

Farewells are never easy and this one harder than most. As Father Hank departs from his time with us to take him into retirement and to find out "What the heck God has in store for him next," we say farewell; Godspeed.

Three Things: Angels, Cell Phones and Hard Hats

I hold Sara’s furry little body in one hand. She is alive, but life is evaporating quickly and I rub her with one finger looking for some response. I put drop of water on her lips that rolls off and drips onto my hand along with Cadence’s tears. Hamsters are supposed to live two years and Sara is just a baby. It is time to leave for church and Sara makes her final exit, eliciting quiet sobs from Cadence. We place her in a check box and tuck her in with tissues, agreeing to a funeral service after church.

At the end of the service, Father Hank zigzags his recession from the alter, stopping to greet the smallest of parishioners along his path. His stop with Cadence lingers a moment as she speaks to him quietly about Sara. He speaks back to her, pats her back and then moves along. Later that evening after the funeral, I answered the telephone. “This is Father Hank and I was wondering if I could speak to my friend Cadence.” They chatted for quite a long time about Heaven and hamsters; Hank, whose life is enmeshed with so many, is never too busy for the needs of his parish, large and little.

Hank is always walking the walk; teaching by example. He is a vessel of divine interchange between God and his people. He reminds us regularly that we never know when we are entertaining angels unaware; witnesses to God’s grace daily as he uses people to do his work. Being with Hank is like entertaining an angel, but fully aware. I have never met a more humble servant to the Lord. Hank embodies absolute devotion; loyal to God’s truth and not to the restrictions of earthy policies.

For the last ten years, Hank has stood before us, Sunday after Sunday, breaking the rules designed by the church; radical in a peaceful, loving way. He stands before us, boldly breaking tradition with regulation and says that “Everyone… without exception…is invited to our Lord’s table.”

Having been raised a Roman Catholic, but an Episcopalian of ten years; I have adjusted to the group confession just before Communion. I have adjusted to the idea that all baptized Christians are eligible for Communion, even the very young. This was the biggest adjustment; children receiving communion without a formal right of passage at a designated age. At the age of three, Tyler asked one Sunday morning “Did Jesus say ‘take this all you grown-ups and eat it, this is my body given for you…’” That Sunday he received his first communion.

Hank reminds us regularly; Jesus did not say all of you Catholics or Episcopalians or even those of you without sin. He indeed said “Take this all of you…” and Hank takes him at his Word. Jesus outstretched a hand to the unclean, the sinners the lost and the exiled and said “Come, follow me.” I believe He speaks through Hank’s mouth on Sunday and every day.

Hank practices a unique method that combines divine communication and technology known to us fondly as: “Cell Phone Theology.” When faced with situations not clearly defined in the Pastor Play Book and even when they are and the plays don’t make sense, Hank engages in a prayerful state that uses that a high tech direct line to call Jesus for the absolute Word on WWJD. More often than not, the answer was clear all along.

Hanks sermons are laced with scripture and he speaks with bible ready in hand. On occasion, he uses other props and I am sure none of us will forget Hank preaching with his hard hat and life vest on. Our experience, he explains, is not to be a passive one, but one in which the Holy Spirit shakes things up and we need to be prepared for Him to move in and through our lives.

Father Hank describes our congregation as a beautiful New England pond; picturesque and placid on the surface but with a multitude of events happening beneath the surface; good and bad. He has taught us to be aware that the person to our left might be celebrating and the person to our right grieving; it is up to us to reach out to one another.

Father Hank preaches always in threes, beginning every Sermon with three points, seemingly unrelated and speaks poignantly, fluidly, pacing and pausing and feeling every word until he wraps the three together in a tight and powerful message. I believed that I have finally, after ten years, learned the three that he came to teach me.

I have learned to be open to angels and finally understand that some days they will surround me using the people in my path, and that at other times God will use me in a small but divine intervention in someone else’s life, as long as I remain open.

I have learned that doing what is right might mean stepping over the line; outside of the easy and the obvious. God’s answers to our questions are there for us when we learn how to communicate with Him.

I have learned that it is important to shake things up and to be prepared to

endure the bumps and sharp turns that may result. We are supposed to be actively partaking in this journey; not sideline observers.

And so as Father Hank prepares to move onward in his journey, I stand ready, hard hat on and cell phone in hand to mingle with angels and to practice the lessons that he has taught me over the last ten years. I am honored, grateful and blessed to have known Father Hank.

ROMANCE

He had one pink silk rose, forty dollars and a plan. Of course he doesn’t have a car and forty dollars wasn’t enough. “I want to give her roses and tell her that I will love her until all of the roses die…but see, one won’t die because it is silk.” He explains.

He wrote her a beautiful song, recorded it and put it on her iPod and waits anxiously for sixth period to end so he can leave school. I drive him to the florist to locate roses that match the silk one and yes, swipe the debit card where he comes up short.

“You can take the car.” I tell him before he asks, knowing he wants to bring them to her before the end of the school day. He scribbles on the card, dabs on some cologne and grabs the keys. I hand him the bag with the giant chocolate kiss I bought for him for Valentines Day, knowing he would rather give it to her than eat it.

“Thanks Mom.” He smiles as he departs on his mission.

“Drive carefully.” I tell him.

A+ for romance, I think to myself.

THE WRITING'S ON THE WALL

“You have a Facebook? Trevor sneers in that fourteen-year-old, you’ve got to be kidding tone laced with amusement. He sits at my computer prepared to sign into to the cyber social network.

“No.” I answered. “I just made an account to I could visit Jake’s memorial page. I don’t actually have a Facebook.” I answer, leaving the room.

“You have no profile!” he yells to me in the kitchen.

“Don't want one.” I yell back.

Facebook , like IM-ing and texting, is something that clearly draws the generational line. Even email seems to be for the elders and the telephone reserved for talking to girls. They much prefer to instant message and text message and now are writing on walls.

“You’re interested in men?” He asks.

“No!” I answer zipping back to my office. “Why would I be interested in men?”

“Okaay…” he says, “but if I check women everyone will think you’re gay. You have to pick one or the other.”

“No I don’t. I’m not interested in anything! Stop messing around with that.” I demand feeling panic surging.

“But your profile is blank and you have no friends.” He snickers.

“I have friends but we don’t make advertisements about ourselves or write on walls and… just leave it blank. I don’t want a….what did you do?” I shriek, seeing my picture beneath my name.

“I added the photo from your blog. Relax Mom. Do you want your birthday on here?” He does not seem to understand that grown-ups do not Facebook.

“Why would I want people reading about me? Identity thieves and…”

“Seriously Mom, no one can read this stuff unless you add them to your friend list. Besides, you can search for old friends from high school and stuff. I’ll show you, give me a name.” he says, fingers tapping the keys. I offer up the name of a college roommate that I haven't seen in more than twenty five years and in a click, there she is! Trevor explains that I can add her as a friend and she will get a message asking her to be my friend.

“No! Sign off. This is ridiculous.” I conjure up an image of a pathetic, lonely hermit with no real life, searching cyber space for play dates.

“Fine.” He signed off, “But you have no friends.” he mumbles.

One month later, I received an email that a friend on the west coast sent a request to add me to her “friend list” on her Facebook page. Soon thereafter, one from a mom here in town, and then another.

Grown-ups Facebooking!

The subject came up at a party last night and low and behold, nearly half of the people admitted to Facebook-ing.

This morning, my Facebook suggested some “new friends” for me, no doubt taking pity on my tiny friend list and vacant profile. You have no friends it echos the page maker. Maybe I should step back into my own generation...

Then again...maybe writing on walls will be liberating.

IT'S A BOY!

Mr Green Jeans is proud to announce....It's a boy! In spite of the season, in spite of my grumblings, in spite of the snow, his pumpkin plant has flowered. The first flower is a male standing tall and proud, awaiting a neighboring female bud who is taking her own time. The paint brushes are ready...stay tuned.

THE BEST GIFT

A couple of days before Christmas, I went into hyper- aerobic preparation mode. Never did finish shopping, still had lingering reports to type, food to prepare and my home had taken on that college dormitory look. Family would be arriving in on Christmas Eve to stay with us and I felt tempted to put a “closed for renovation” sign on the Inn. I was nowhere close to ready and if I added back the hours that I would normally sleep, there were still not enough to accomplish everything. I had vowed earlier in the season to “let go” of the unimportant things; not to sweat the little stuff, but alas, I was gripped with the reality that too much big stuff had fallen away and that I never seem to get it all together.

The outside of my body worked swiftly and quietly but inside my head there was a raging storm of “to do” lists that kept growing. Cadence sat in the den quietly drawing. I barely recognized that she was involved in her own preparation for the season. I could hear her humming and singing in the background as I did my acrobatic multi-tasking; adding baking soda and salt here, adding to the grocery list there, counting gifts to be sure everyone was covered.

“Mom,” Cadence asked coming into the kitchen, hand held behind her back. “Where can I find a frame?”

I searched my mind to see if frame hunting would fit on my overflowing to-do list but I felt impending rupture in my brain and could not accommodate.

“Sorry honey, I just can’t.”

“Just tell me where and I will get it myself.” she persisted, not one to give up easily.

“Cadence, NO.” I heard myself say in a voice that was less than kind. “You’ll have to just make do for now. Everything is stored away and not easy to get to and I just cannot take time to do that now. I have way to much to do and no help and ….”

“Alright, never mind.” She said, in hopes if avoiding what she recognized as possible mother melt-down. “I’ll make one.”

“Don’t look.” She instructed as she stretched the cord across the counter for the hot glue gun; cardboard cuttings scattered on the counter and floor around her.

I bit my lip, moving to a different section of the to do list, wanting to shriek “Get Out of the Kitchen!” A short time later, she was gone in search of wrapping paper, leaving debris in her wake.

“There. She announced, smile of satisfaction spread smoothly on her face, “I’m putting this under the tree….it’s for you.”

Christmas morning came and Cadence was pulled by her stocking and the new gifts under the tree that Santa left. She dragged her teenage brothers from bed and they worked diligently on round one…the Santa gifts.

We reassembled after wrappings were collected, pastries served, coffee poured and bathrooms visited to the more relaxed part of the morning…family gifts. Cadence was beyond excited for me to open hers first. I removed the neatly wrapped package and I looked at the snowy drawing of the front of our home, snowman smiling and waving. My heart ached a little as I looked at the frame. It was backed with corrugated cardboard and the front mounted with thin strip of the same; four pieces cut exactly to size held together with clear glue adorned with the signature strings of hot glue gun.

I flashed back to the day she made it, feeling guiltily that I did not have a minute to hunt for a frame. I had let go of the wrong “little things” and the frame was like a reminder to me of the real priorities in life. I stared at the picture for a bit, commenting on the details and Cadence smiled the warm smile of giving.

“Wait Mom, you have to read the note.” She said, still wiggling with anticipation. The outside of the wrapping paper held a pocket made of the same paper, carefully taped to the front. I pulled out the note and received my best Christmas present ever.

Although I will never find a frame as perfect as the one she made, the gift of her words will be framed and treasured.

ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE

I look at her sitting sleepy-eyed across the table, hair still messed with bedtime; it is eleven in the morning. I love the late night movies and lazy mornings of vacation. Having been awake for several hours and on my third cup of coffee, I buzz with the possibilities and requirements of the day at hand.

“Mom…” she yawns in protest to my impending monologue, “I just woke up.”

“I know and I’ll fix you some breakfast, but I want to talk to you about time. You know how during a busy week with school and homework and sports and play rehearsal we often find ourselves short on time? Sometimes we have to prioritize and look at what we have time for and what has to get done and decide to leave some things for later.” I tell her, moving myself closer so as not to lose her attention and I continue with my time management speech.

“Well, we had twelve whole days off which seemed like a huge chunk of time and we did a lot of putting off.” I tell her, looking straight into her big brown eyes. “First it was Christmas Eve, then Christmas Day, then the day after Christmas and time to relax and enjoy new things, then a play date and before you know it we were into New Year’s Eve. Well, believe it or not, we are down to an ordinary weekend left and there is a lot for both of us to do. I plan to pack up all of the Christmas stuff, but you need to work on finishing that chapter book and writing your review, so, I want you to make a plan for when exactly you are going to get things done in the next two days.”

Cadence’s hand rises like a student in school, “I know this is slightly off the point, but did Jesus have an older sister?” she asks.

I feel my hands slap against both sides of my cheeks in astonishment and close my eyes briefly. Managing this family is no easy task. I bite my lip as Cadence explains that packing up Christmas made her look at the nesting dolls in which the baby reminded her of Jesus. There are four. A mother, a father and one older sibling that is a girl. She just wondered about that....

I have been thinking a lot lately about the difference between convergent and divergent thinking patterns.

My step-father is a brilliant man and Doctor of Education. He had used terms some time ago to describe my first and last born: high creative, divergent thinkers.

I knew that they were creative and thought the term divergent simply meant different. I have learned a great deal since then.

Convergent thinking is an inward process that takes in various pieces of information, compiles and analyzes them and produces an answer or a solution.

It is the most common and natural thought process; the way that most of us learn.

It is predominantly the way schools teach.

Divergent thinking is an outward process whereby a piece of information serves as a stimulus that produces possible solutions to a problem, often stretching into the unknown or less obvious; sort of a springboard that fires ideas outward.

We teach our children in convergent patterns; doling out little bits of known fact or information that they digest and reproduce into a correct answer. Our schools try to take our convergent thinkers beyond their natural skill into a higher level of thinking, stretching their thought process by using their imagination to go outside of the box. Science is a great example with hypothesis and experiment. It is not a natural skill for most and is gently baited and enticed in order to get our children to take risks and push beyond. Programs like “Destination Imagination” use teams of students to problem solve using these types of thinking skills in competition with other schools.

It is a desired skill.

This pattern of thinking is used as enrichment to our convergent teaching.

For the child who owns this pattern, it is a deficit.

The child wired with divergent thinking as the dominant pattern of learning is known to have a “disorder” when in fact, they have a different order.

As teachers dole out pieces of information, which the majority of students collect and digest, it is inevitable that one of these pieces will serve as the stimulus that sets the divergent pattern into gear, firing off ideas or possibilities within the mind and during this array of fireworks, the teacher continues to dole out more pieces of information, missed by the divergent thinker. The result is that they lose pace with the class, often not knowing where they are supposed to be and missing important instruction.

For the adults doling out the information, this is exasperating and the child is called upon again and again to ‘pay attention’; an abstract phrase that to them means they are doing something wrong. They don’t, in fact, know how or why they aren’t “paying attention.” They don’t know what they are doing wrong and quite simply, they aren’t really ‘doing’ anything other than following their natural circuitry.

As parents and teachers, we attempt to “correct” the “problem” with typical strategies of reward and consequence, assuming that they can change this pattern. We assume this thinking pattern is willful.

Reward for success is the most basic of training techniques, successful in teaching even our pets to ‘sit.” Like other children, the DT child wants the reward, but time and time again fails to produce the required behavior. Slowly, they begin to see themselves as inadequate.

Consequences are a part of life and by middle school, not keeping pace results in many negative ones, highlighting the difference between the DT child and their peers; often publicly which over time, erodes their self esteem.

While we accept the wiring and thinking patterns of the convergent structure in our children, encouraging them to stretch beyond, the same treatment is not given to the divergent thinker, who is required, rather than encouraged daily to fight against what naturally occurs, being told they simply “must pay attention” and they must master this other pattern; a tall order for five, eight or ten-year- olds who barely understand the demand. We do not place the demand to self re-wire on the rest of the students.

Einstein knew well these struggles. He did not fit in the box. He failed at school. He failed at his ideas again and again. He persevered, much to our benefit, however not all divergent thinkers are so strong willed.

With my oldest son, striving for rewards proved pointless, mounting evidence to him that he simply was not capable of success. The hard line of consequences built resentment and he took defense in retreat. We continued to fight this battle, sanding his edges to fit this hexagon peg into a round hole. The casualty of this battle was his motivation. He simply gave up trying.

Out of desperation to see my oldest son thrive, I offered rewards, issued consequences and ultimately sought out the medical solution. I believed that if a child couldn’t focus his eyes, I would surely give him glasses and if there was a medical solution that would focus his brain, I owed him the same assistance. In fifth grade we put him on stimulant medication.

I thought at first that we had discovered magic. He was tolerable to the adults around him and the medication surly muted the firing of divergent thought. It toned him down to where he could sit through an assembly at school without bothering anyone and it made him easier to be around.

It also muted the very essence of him; of his creativity and his passion. He was able to methodically perform some rote tasks without the usual disturbance, but motivation did not recover. He did not thrive. He spent six years filling his body with a drug that disguised the wiring of his brain to others, but did not enhance his learning or change his design.

Halfway through his junior year of high school, he refused to take the medication. School for him became a place he had to show up, get by and get out. He immerses himself now in the places that he is brilliant; music and art and my prayer for him is that he finds a future path where those things can take him to success.

My youngest now faces the reality of her design. She, too, is a creative, divergent thinker. Unlike her brother, she is resilient and determined.

She is profoundly self aware.

She is aware of her strengths and weaknesses.

I now have clarity about my job as her mother.

My job is not to offer unattainable rewards or inevitable consequences, but to arm her with the knowledge that she is designed differently than most and to support her in the realization that she will have to work harder.

My job is to make her aware that only some people will get it and even fewer will accept it, but she must strive hard to achieve in spite of this adversity.

My job is to help her discover techniques that compensate for her weakness in the convergent structure of school and encourage her to hold fast to the gifts she has been given.

My job is to teach her that the wiring of her brain was designed by God with a purpose and perhaps that purpose will take some struggling to be realized.

Did Jesus have an older sister? I don’t know.

Is it possible? Certainly.

My faith teaches me that all things are possible with God and it seems He hard-wired that into some little brains. They believe in possibility and if we don’t convince them otherwise...

God only knows where they may lead us.

Thank you Bruce for you understanding and wisdom!

PLANTING THE SEED

I made an arrangment with my family when I first started my blog that I would show them pieces I planned to post before I posted them...only fair as they are the main characters of my life story. I have devieated at bit from this original arrangement, often not sharing the post until it has been posted. Such was the case with Mr.GreenJeans

My husband got quite a chuckle out of the post, but even better, out of the comments. He as been called things before in comments to my stories including my favorite "a boob" but this comment section describes him as "kind-hearted, a gem, a keeper and cool" and oh is he loving it! In fact, the very words have inspired the growth of his pumpkin plant and the little fella is now loaded with flower buds and sprouting its first tendrils.

Yesterday, he moved it to a real pot in a better window. Now he has sprouted baby tomato plants from promising seeds that defied the odds and sprouted within the parent tomato. Please...don't anyone suggest corn!

DIVERGENT AT THE DMV

Sitting with my seventeen-year-old at the Department of Motor Vehicles., I am amused by the thought that this is similar to watching a movie, however instead of watching on a screen, we are thrust into the middle of the scene. A young woman behind me shares loudly with her friend the ‘he said, she said’ drama of her recent break-up by reading the back and forth text messages between she and her estranged boyfriend. It is highly personal and she is highly unaware or indifferent to the fact that we can all hear her.

In front of us in the one hour line is a woman with her teenage daughter, here for the same purpose that we are; to take the written knowledge test for licensing. It is obvious that they are mother and daughter as they resemble one another and they chat quietly making sure they have brought all of the correct documents. They stand together for quite some time until the girl tires of standing and slips out of the line to find a chair to text message. She wears the usual uniform; UGGS and a North Face jacket, flashy new cell phone beneath her polished fingernails. Mom continues to stand, holding her daughter’s place in line. Her purse catches my eye; cranberry colored leather with pockets and buckles with a tear in the leather where the strap attaches to the bag. She is neatly dressed in jeans and a simple jacket, no distinct labels and tired black leather shoes. They had looked so similar these two women until this moment and now the distinction is clear between them; the giver and the taker.

After standing in line for at least one hour, we are shifted over to ‘the chairs’ where we await the calling of names in painfully slow order to step into the back to take the vision and written tests. Our conversations to this point have been few and bizarre. “Did you ever think about what it looks like inside the gas tank of a car?” Tyler asks me. “No.” I answer honestly, shaking my head. “Seriously think about it…” he continues, “Imagine if you could not see inside of a glass but simply put the liquid in and poured it back out when you drank, but could never see what it looked like inside…it would be weird, right?” He asks.

I stare at him for a moment wondering who thinks these things, but I know my answer. He does. Cadence does. Divergent thinkers. But do divergent thinkers pass driving exams? We see a girl emerging from the back with tight lips and frantic eyes that begin to leak failure down her cheeks. “I got six wrong.” she squeaks to her mom, pulling her coat from her mom’s arms and walking head-down toward the door. I think about the fact that Tyler has not once opened the manual for this test. He attended the 30 classroom hours at a driving school and said there was no need to study...he got it. We sit quietly for a while, he texting and I enjoying a baby across the room. I see another girl with the manual in her lap, flipping rapidly through the pages, taking in all that she could in her final preparations. “Did you even get one of those books?” I ask him. He nods. “Shouldn’t you review it?”

“I’m so sick of that book.” he answers without looking up. “We used it in those classes.” The gate opens from the back and a girl who looks younger than sixteen emerges, this one unable to hide her distress. Tears stream down her face and she rushes to her mother, “I failed.” She chokes out between sobs, “he said I didn’t ….” and the rest was lost as she pushed her way to the ladies room where her sobs were even louder. Ten minutes later, her mother followed her in.

“It’s not looking good.” I tell Tyler, “Are you going to cry if you fail?”

“Well yeah…” he answers as if that was a dumb question, “And then I’m heading straight for the Ladies room. Actually,” he continues in a pseudo-serious tone, “I never really pictured myself driving until I was twenty eight.”

“Twenty eight?” I ask him, my eyes wide. “Yeah. See, I don’t really need to drive. Right now I have my friends that drive and the bus and….you,” he shoots a dimpled grin, “and then I’ll go to college. I’ll live across the street from my classrooms so I won’t need to drive. Then when I graduate, I’ll get a job in the city and be able to walk to work. Besides, there are other means of transportation like bikes and skate boards and roller blades… huh…?” He nudges like he’s really onto something. “Think about how great it would be if there were no cars… it would be much better for the environment and everyone could rollerblade. We could replace all of the stop lights with disco balls and just think how much that would save in electricity. Then everyone would just dance at the intersections and there would be no accidents…”

“Tyler.” The officer in back calls. He is short and bald and looks like a Marine drill sergeant. Tyler hops up in his purple jeans, pea coat and converse sneakers; his long blond hair covering one eye and spiked earrings poking through. I have the urge to run behind him to remind him to push the hair out of his eyes on the vision test and not to answer his cell phone during the test but alas…I cannot help him. His world is filled with disco balls and roller blades and perhaps 28 is the right age for him to drive.

In about twenty minutes he emerges and sits next to me; no tears, no ladies room. He explains quietly that you need 20 out of 25 correct and once you hit 20 correct answers, the machine flashes and says “pass.” The ‘pass flash’ came after his 20^th question.

I guess the disco ball intersections will have to wait.