Bethany Pierce

2: 22 PM

In Baltimore seated at a counter that allows a good view for people watching.
Airports are the kinds of places that sound really interesting until you have to stay in one for longer than fifty-two minutes.  So far I’ve stared aimlessly for a cumulative three hours, read for twenty minutes, and listened to my iPod for three. (I really should have made a flying play list—the 5K mix is not at all helpful when you have to sit unmoving sharing a quarter inch armrest with a fellow passenger who doesn’t fit in the tiny seating arrangement any better than you.)  I have also learned the Spanish for To Flush: Poner. No Poner toallas en el sanitario.   The sanitario can only swallow so much, people.

But I suppose there are fun things about airports. For one, they are the only places where I indulge in ten-dollar sandwiches and seven-dollar magazines.   And take-off is always, always fabulous. 

Despite the blue skies and the sizable bulk of the aircraft, landing made for a rough ride. I rarely get sick on flights, but I was a bit nauseous touching down this afternoon.  Against instinct, I decided to medicate my nausea with a Quizno’s sub and now feel much better. The homesickness is wearing off and I’m actually getting excited now about Boston.  Enough glucose to the brain and I might actually become chipper.

I’m still not sure how this weekend will pan out. At some point tomorrow I need to see the apartment I’m sitting and then, within the same four-hour span, I need to be there to see my brother walk for his diploma. I haven’t even looked at a map of Boston, so hopefully both things can happen in the same morning to afternoon-ish.

As for my brother: my parents received a letter a week ago that said he is in the upper five percentile of his graduating class. So the kid’s a genius. This surprises no one.

Oh, Fount of Fowl Blessing

Moving. It's been a while since I've done this, but the cardboard “paper-cuts” and the screeching sound of stretching packing tape are very familiar. As a pastor's kid I moved about as much as a military brat; no matter how long I stay in a place, Moving Day is a coming home in and of itself.

Moving as a pastor’s family was a reach into the grab-bag. We always lived in the church parsonage, which meant in terms of housing we got what we got. An outdoor window connecting the kitchen to the den? A good way to ensure fast passing of hot pizza from the oven to the TV room on Pizza Movie Night. Carpet the hue of week old pea soup? Well, we could suffer it for Jesus.

Of course, in all the oddball houses we lived in, certain things remained constant. There were pancakes on Saturday morning and church Sunday morning. There were Christmas parties every December. A lot of reading and imagination coupled with as little television as possible.

One thing that stayed the same was the Wooden Chicken: a six inch tall cup carved to resemble said bird. (Yes, I know, it taxes the imagination, but the chicken resemblance is beside the point.) Every time Mom or Dad received a note of praise, encouragement, or thanks, they kept it in the chicken. Over the years, the letters got bent and smashed, as it got more and more difficult to fit them into the overflowing Chicken. For every happy letter they may have received as many criticisms, complaints, or worse, most of which they were careful to keep hidden from us kids. But the thanks and congratulations—those were preserved and kept on display, the idea being that with time the lesser complaints would be forgotten in light of the many scraps of gratitude. Anytime things got bad, Mom and Dad could get out the Chicken and read reminders of what good they’d done in their corner of the world.

I don’t have a chicken but I do have a polka-a-dot shoebox. Packing up my apartment, I've come across seven year's accumulation of correspondence with friends and family. The first dozen letters all encourage me to stay in school because it would get better. Then come the cards congratulating me on graduating, followed by the even more grand congrats for my first gallery show and the publication of my first novel. These followed by the letters wishing A and I well on our engagement and the notes left by my most recent students telling me what a difference our English class made their freshmen year. My shoebox is filled to the brim.

People say, “When it rains it pours.” Apparently this metaphor can apply to goodness as well as crisis. I don’t know if I have the capacity for more goodness, but God seems intent on sending it down in a steady torrent.

My Chicken Overfloweth.