Lucky

It’s been a while since I’ve shared reflections here. The stroke I experienced last August has significantly affected my energy, ability to type, and time (much spent in rehabilitation exercises). I am getting stronger and working hard to recover as I much as I’m able.

 Today, as I sorted some files, I found a piece I had written exactly a generation ago and was drawn back into the moment as though no years have passed at all. Our granddaughter, Ashley, graduated from high school a few weeks ago. I wrote this reflection when our daughter, Alisa, Ashley’s mother, graduated from high school 34 years ago.

 

Lucky

“This has been a week of passages for our family. Last Thursday, Alisa graduated from high school, and today is her eighteenth birthday. Dick and I have called in our last absence excuse, signed our lastpermission slip, and received our last report card in the mail (the University gives those directly to the student). I guess I’ll still retain my identity as ‘Alisa’s mother,’ but we are now a family of adults.

“During the week, as I reflected on the years gone by, I remembered a little dialogue that I had written when Alisa was about eight. She was at her first day of tennis lessons at Golden Gate Park, and she was getting acquainted with the other girls.

Alisa:                     ‘Where do you go to school?’

Other Girls:          ‘Brook.’

                                ‘Hamlin.’

                                ‘Towne.” [All exclusive expensive, private schools.]

                                ‘Where do you go to school?’

Alisa                       ‘Ulloa.’ [Our neighborhood public school.]

Other Girls:           ‘Gee, I’ve never heard of that. Where is it?’

Alisa                         ‘It’s down by the zoo.’

Other Girls:              ‘Wow, are you ever lucky! Can you walk to the zoo?’

Alisa:                          ‘I can’t really walk, but I really am lucky, because the streetcar goes right down the hill past the corner                 where our house is. And I’m even more lucky because it comes right back up the hill past our corner. And I’m super-lucky, because our house has a basement with a room in it.’

Other Girls:               ‘Wow!! Are you ever lucky!’”

As I found and read this these many years later, I think of how “lucky” we are indeed. Along with my then eight-year-old daughter, I find blessing not about how much we have or where we come from, or what we do, but about how much we see and are grateful for what is ours to experience.

As we come to our country’s big birthday, with divisions great and deep, many of us don’t know how to bridge the chasm. My hearts ache with the splits within us as a nation, but I listen again to this little girl dialogue from so long ago between the rich girls and the humility of our daughter, I remember that gratitude can bring about connection.

May we see again all that we have been given and be grateful.