for Griffin

Yesterday was a first: Gracyn passed on coming over to my house. She passed–politely but decisively! She was packing her bag for a sleepover with her cousin and had her sites fixed firmly on this upcoming event.

But not to worry: in my sanctuary of double-delight, there’s Griffin, age three, who never passes. Because coming to my house is tantamount to visiting Disney Land. Because coming to my house involves creating a motor village that stretches the length and width of the dining room. Because coming to my house involves Tootsie Pops that you can throw away after two licks if you find you don’t really fancy that flavor today. Because coming to my house involves sacred one-on-one time that grandmas who have retired from teaching can freely give.

I have to admit that when Griff wanted to play doll house with the Fisher Price and Dora the Explorer families, I thought, Well, o.k., this is familiar territory. Gracyn and I have had a countless rounds of doll house narratives. I’m good to go. Only I was not. Not really, that is. When Griff picked up Dora’s magic mirror and proceeded to use it as a laser gun to pick off Dora’s grandma (why does the grandma have to go first???) and several of the girls, I knew I was going to have to get with the new story, or all of my people would be summarily wiped out.

I tried a climatic turn: Let’s say the naughty guy with the laser gun is really our friend. . . One more girl got zapped. I mean, he’s really not a bad guy–just a lonely guy. . . The father got zapped, then zapped again to make sure he was truly down. In a desperate attempt to turn the story, I tried again: Hey, do you want to come to our picnic? Zap, zap, zap. At this point, I’m out of people, and the only guy standing is the one with the magic mirror-turned laser.

Quickly I determined that the sanctuary of double-delight would require a new perspective, a definitely more male perspective. We turned to trains, trucks and cars, and the result: crashes, spectacular crashes with even more spectacular sound effects. Which Griffin has perfected after hours of play. The boy can make a motor sound, lips perpetually buzzing, for up to thirty minutes without taking a breath, I swear!

Read books, Nanny? Griffin opened the book cabinet and brought a handful of his favorites to the couch. Hallelujah, I know how to do this. And it’s a resting activity (vs. the aerobic doll house/motor vehicle activities)!  In the sanctuary of double-delight, you must be prepared for new perspectives and new play-taking risks. But, blessedly, you must also be prepared for the same all-encompassing joy to spread through you when your grandson presses himself against your side, his small hand resting on your forearm, guiding you as you turn the pages, his breathing slower now as his eyes take in each object on each page. Then he says, Oh no! He’s sad, Nanny. The dog wants to go with them. And you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that in spite of his recent three-year male bravado, he shares his sister’s sensitivity and keen insights. Griffin sees with his eyes and with his heart.

Double-delight, via Griffin, comes with laughter of the Glorious (capital G) sort.

Griff can go from contemplative to raucous, belly-shaking, contagious laughter in a split second. The boy can really laugh. In the sanctuary of double-delight, laughter of this magnitude is always welcome.

And just in case you need more than visual proof, check out this video of Griffin in the throes of laughter. Viewer discretion advised: Be prepared to split a gut–or at least crack a big smile.

https://www.facebook.com/100005494067014/videos/vb.100005494067014/390420977817701/?type=2

And genuine double-delight? When your granddaughter cannot help but join in, laughing at her brother and validating a moment of simple joy.

Just when you think you cannot take any more delight, Griff walks into our house, announces I’m here, Nanny! sits on the bottom step to take off his shoes, and marches right to the candy bowl to pluck a handful of Tootsie Rolls, and plops himself on the couch. I look outside to see his motorized John Deere tractor parked by the front porch.

Griff, does your mommy know you’re here? Chewing, chocolate oozing from the corners of his mouth, he bares his brown teeth and says, I really love you, Nanny. In the sanctuary of double-delight, verbal deflection of this kind is not only excusable, it is encouraged.

Because I plan to be a life-time member of this sanctuary, I can see that I’m going to have to do all that’s in my power to literally keep up with Griffin. I have a plan, though: the next time we play doll house, I’m calling dibs on the magic mirror/laser gun.

Watch out, Griff–you have met your match!

For fellow make-believers extraordinaire: Susan and Beth

First of all, let me set the record straight: the sanctuary of make-believe is not an exclusive one. Children of all ages, sizes and shapes may enter. This is great news for a 61 year-old child who has a life-time membership to this sanctuary. Great news, indeed.

From my earliest memories, I was a make-believer. Give me a Barbie, a stuffed animal–heck, give me a stick or rock–and I will find its story. My sisters and I propped up an old wooden crate by the fence at the side of our yard, attached a piece of rope for reins, and christened it Jumbo, the elephant. We had just seen The Greatest Show on Earth,  and my dad had graciously gifted us with an old pigeon crate. For days, we our rode that thing until we moved on to a new story. Imagine the looks of college students passing by on their way to class as three girls frantically whipped the side of the crate with sticks, yelling, Go Jumbo, Go!

In high school, I carried the sanctuary of make-believe with me, initiating willing friends (you know who you are). We dared each other to take our world into the real world. Having located several yards with an abundance of lawn ornaments, we sent willing make-believers–one at a time, mind you–into these yards to talk to and to pet plaster deer, burros, and dogs. Waiting in the get-away car, we howled as motorists and neighbors looked on, some in confusion and others in delight. The night we found a yard with Snow White and all of the Seven Dwarfs? The gates to the sanctuary of make-believe opened with fireworks and trumpet fanfare!

The sanctuary of make-believe can be a solitary venture, but I’m hear to confess that it is best when shared. My make-believe venture into the world of Olympic curling has been shared, and re-shared with students, family, friends, and colleagues. In short, this story has legs! Just when it appears to be waning, a fellow make-believer will shock it into life again, propelling it to the foreground.

Just this morning when I was sweeping my kitchen (wait for the irony of this action), I heard my phone ping and saw that I had been tagged in a Facebook post. I dumped my dustpan in the garbage and went to check this out. When I read the post, I realized that I had hit paydirt: my curling story, once only a solitary figment of my imagination, had gone viral! Well, maybe not viral–exaggeration is actually permissible and encouraged in the sanctuary of make-believe–but it made the internet. For proof of this, check out the following link (if you, too, are willing to enter this make-believe sanctuary):

http://ecjanzen7.wixsite.com/mysite/single-post/2016/09/02/From-Teaching-to-The-Olympics

The fellow make-believers who shocked this story into life again had also sent me a letter last spring, weeks before I retired, delivered by the high school principal himself. In this letter, with an official-looking American Curling Federation logo, I learned that I finally had been accepted to the Olympic Curling Team and would be preparing for the 2018 Seoul Olympics. As I read the letter aloud to my students, most looked on with mild amusement. If I had had time to train them better, I could have worked them into genuine amusement, maybe even outright laughter. But alas, I retired.

Because my friends had breathed new life into the curling story, I rushed to Walmart to buy a t-shirt, stencils and puff paint. That evening, I recreated the logo from my curling letter, and made myself an official-looking training shirt. The next day, I wore it to school. When I made my way to the classrooms of my fellow make-believers, I was stopped by others who asked about my shirt. Oh this? I said. This is proof that I am officially training for the Seoul Olympics as a U.S. Curler. It’s legit. They’re calling me up.

And when I finally approached my fellow make-believers? They gasped, they oohed and aahed, they offered congratulations for a life-long dream now realized. They offered support, insisted that I would have a large home fan-base, and pledged to pass on the great news. They played along. And in the sanctuary of make-believe, it just does not get much better than this.

So here’s to the sanctuary of make-believe! May it live long, and its players live well! For those who are willing to enter, it offers treasures of inestimable worth and cheap, but wholesome, entertainment.

Looking ahead, I’m hoping for a significant fan-base as I prepare for my Olympic debut. If you can help me out, my curling trainers and I would really appreciate it.

Oh, and I’m looking for some gently-used teflon-soled curling shoes. If any of you happen to have a pair that you’re no longer using, message me: I will pay top dollar.

For Gracyn

Disclaimer: It goes without saying that ALL grandmas will argue–vehemently–that their grandchildren are the most brilliant, attractive, talented human beings on the planet. Today, however, with the limited power of my pen, I pay special tribute to my delightful granddaughter, Gracyn. 

In the sanctuary of delight, Gracyn is Delightful (with a capital D). If delight were being debuted as one of Crayola’s new crayons, it would be named Gracyn’s Eyes. For beneath these cornflower blue eyes–rimmed with blond eyelashes so long and lush that they curl back against the eyelids above them–lies a mystical cauldron that perpetually churns, stews and brews. Until, having reached the boiling point, a single bubble breaks the surface. Fragile at first, its translucent surface wobbly at take-off, it gains speed and purpose in flight. And then it bursts into words and images and perceptions that are, quite simply, delightful.

Recently Gracyn brought their dog Gus over to visit our dog. As we were walking back she said, “You know, they have different barks, but their breath voices are the same.” “Breath voices?” I asked. Then she panted to demonstrate. “Oh, breath voices,” I said. In the sanctuary of delight, panting just does not cut it. But breath voices? Oh yeah, baby.

A few years ago when we were playing wedding with our mermaid dolls (Gracyn was the bride, of course, and I was the bridesmaid–always the bridesmaid, never the bride), Gracyn announced, “Get ready for the wedding. Bridesmaid, wash your hands. I mean, really, they smell like chocolate feet.” Chocolate feet? Again, Gracyn’s use of language delights even the most literal among us.

A year ago my husband, Paul, and Gracyn had drawn pictures, and he had just finished telling the story that went along with his drawing. To which Gracyn commented,  That’s pretty good, Papa, but you need to elaborate more.  In the sanctuary of delight, elaboration is always a good idea. Through elaboration, the delightful understand that new details, new images, new insights emerge, often and best, through invented language and fresh perspectives.

A couple of Christmases ago, Gracyn was helping me wrap presents, writing names on the gift tags and taping as we wrapped. I forgot and wrote Quinn’s name on a gift tag. When she saw this, she gasped, “Grandma, look at your N! You just need to take your time and draw this line all the way up.” I nodded in silence, which prompted her to add, “but all your other letters are goodly.” Goodly? I would bet that even Charles Dickens himself would be delighted enough to make Gracyn a character in his next tale.

One evening as Gracyn was about to get on her swingset, she looked down into the grass and gasped, “What’s that!” Upon looking closely (really, really closely), I discovered a small beetle making its way across the yard. I told her that it was only a bug (a very, very, very small bug), and looking relieved, she said, “Oh, just a bug. I thought it might be a shrinkened chicken.” A shrinkened chicken? Those who live in the sanctuary of delight will never see just a bug when they can see something straight out of a roadside freakshow. Ladies and gentlemen, step right up and see the world’s smallest shrinkened chicken, right here in rural Iowa!

Once when her parents, Gracyn and her brother, Griffin, stopped by after grocery shopping, Gracyn asked if she could stay for awhile by herself. When I said yes, she grabbed a book off the shelf, stood in front of her parents and brother and pronounced, “The Big Book of Leaving says that you must leave. Now. The Big Book of Leaving says so, so get going.” Delight often requires the language of resourcefulness. So if you need a Big Book of Leaving, a Big Book of Staying, A Big Book of Living or Loving, or whatever, delight is your go-to sanctuary.

When she was four years old, Gracyn and I were playing dollhouse with the Fisher Price people, Dora and friends, and some Dollar Store”girls”. Of course, I had to be the father (and grandfather–I always get the boy roles!) When one of the girls got blown to the top of Dora’s Magic Castle by a tornado, I got the father ready to rescue her. But not so fast, for Gracyn said, “Pretend like the father is afraid of heights and he can’t go up there.” Plan B: “O.K. should he call the police?” Gracyn: “Pretend like he can’t find a phone.” Plan C: Just wait for Gracyn to script my next move. Delightful is being one narrative step ahead of your grandma, surprising her with unexpected climatic turns, prolonging the climax, and always, always, suspending the denouement (which signals the end of the story and, inevitably, time to go home).

During our conversation while driving to church one day, I asked Gracyn if she had seen some beautiful prom dresses the day before when she attended the Davis County promenade with her mom. Gracyn responded that she liked the jeweled dress the best. But then she said, “Wait, grandma, did you say “promenADE?” It’s “promeNOD” Grandma. You don’t say promenADE. You know that, don’t you?” For those who live in the sanctuary of delight, failing to recognize a French word for all its lyrical beauty is a real faux pas (pronounced with proper French vowels, thank you very much!)

When I bought a new box shredder to shred my zucchini for bread and removed it from the sack, Gracyn exclaimed, “Wow, Grandma! You actually got a cowbell!” Seeing something cool (like a cowbell) in the guise of something truly uncool (like a box shredder) is an attribute of the most delightful. And believing that your grandma was going to play the cowbell–preferably in some cool band with real musicians–now that is DELIGHTFUL!

Weeks before her brother, Griffin, was born, Gracyn said to her mother, “Well, I certainly hope when your baby pops out that he doesn’t hit the ceiling!” But later in a car conversation with me, she said,   “Grandma, we will write on a cloud, ‘Griffin is born!‘ Then it will go up to heaven, Jesus will see it, and He’ll know that my baby is born.” From the ridiculous to the sublime–this all matters, and matters deeply–in the sanctuary of delight.

The best thing, bar none, about the sanctuary of delight is the unspoken invitation to enter. So when my granddaughter asked me to jump off of her potty chair, juggling a handful of toys, yelling, “Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, the Amazing Nanny!” I did it, several times actually, to get it just right.

In the sanctuary of delight, it is always best to have a friend (or several). So when Gracyn announced to her Sunday School class that she and I were “BFF”, I didn’t think it could get much better than this. Only it has. Everyday, Gracyn’s bubbles break the surface of all that is ordinary and routine with ever more delight.

Final disclaimer: And just in case you are not yet a believer, check out my daughter’s vimeo tribute to her delightful daughter and my BFF, Gracyn.