Screaming at mockingbirds

There was no reason for her to scream at me like that.

Granted, screaming is just what you do when you haven’t yet learned the niceties of proper conversation. It’s not like I expected the wee child to lift one tiny finger and say, “Grandmother, I would like a dry diaper now, if you would be so kind.”

It's not like I wasn't trying to please the girl. I had diapered, burped, offered a bottle. I had bounced, rocked, rubbed tummy, snuggled, entertained. I had explained, in sincere and soothing tones, that I would happily do ANYTHING Little Miss wanted, if only she would somehow tell me what that was.

Aspen, our first grandchild and — don’t even argue with me, I don’t want to hear it — the cutest baby to ever grace God’s green Earth, joined our merry family in August. Since October first-ish I’ve had the great privilege of spending one day a week with her so her parents can save some childcare bucks while they go to work. My freewheeling freelancer life gives me the flexibility to work from wherever, and sometimes I actually get some work done, although Small Child does her darndest to distract me by the aforementioned cuteness.

This day, though, her smiles and coos turned to impassioned fury. Her forehead unsmoothed into thick wrinkles and her eyes blazed with “What the hell, Grandma??” anger as she shook the ceiling with her cries.

Desperate, worried, I did the mom-bounce — step, bounce, bounce, step, bounce, bounce — and inwardly fished for a lullaby. Maybe music would help.

“Hush, little baby. Don’t say a word,” I began, voice cracking a little. “Mama’s gonna buy you a mockingbird.”

I rock-walked and sang, the motion whooshing me through time. How many hours did I spend as a young mother, singing those same lyrics, bouncing and walking, my own eyes filled with tears? I arrived at motherhood having never changed a diaper, much less cared for a newborn all on my own. I plodded through the first years wracked with insecurity, not knowing if I was doing it right, with no relatives nearby and no friends to lend a hand or a listening ear. How well I remember pacing the creaking floor of my first child’s bedroom in the middle of the night, he wailing in my arms, I weeping to the heavens, lost in hopelessness at my inability to rescue my crying child from his misery.

And now, here I was in that boy’s home, holding his daughter as she cried, singing to her the same song I’d sung to him.

“If that mockingbird won’t sing, Mama’s going to buy you a diamond ring.” Silly me — I was using the wrong name. I got it right on the next line. “If that diamond ring turns brass, Grandma’s going to buy you a looking glass.”

I sang to the screaming girl, promising her other silly gifts. Does an infant want a goat? A bull?? No, she does not. I couldn’t blame her for continuing to howl if that’s the best I had to offer.

As I had 20-some years ago, I forgot what gift came after the dog named Rover who obstinately refused to bark. I started the song over, stepping, rocking, watching my small charge vent her great unhappiness.

I closed my eyes and felt tears hot against their lids. I loved this little girl. “Hush, little baby.” I didn’t know how to help her. “Don’t say a word.” I didn’t know how to protect her from the little griefs that made her scream in my arms . . . or from the big hurts that loom in her future. “Grandma’s gonna buy you a mockingbird.”

Something was different. I realized she had stopped screaming. I opened my eyes and discovered hers looking right at me, still teary but bright, interested.

I kept singing.

“If that mockingbird won’t sing, Grandma’s gonna buy you a diamond ring.” Her eyes still locked on mine, that little stinker opened her mouth and — I swear I’m not making this up — started singing.

Not with words, of course. Nor with a tune, and I’m sure she didn’t think of it as singing. But clear as day, that darling girl was imitating me, cooing along to the music I made. A smile crept into the corners of her little open mouth as we sang together of rings and looking glasses and billygoats.

New tears warmed my eyes, tears of relief but even more of love and the magic of sorrow melting into peace. 

If only I could know that all her life I could sing away her troubles.

If only I had the power to wrap my loved ones in my arms in their dark hours, promise them the world, and watch their sadness fade.

Life doesn’t work like that. She’ll get sad again, and it’ll be real sadness I can’t erase, no matter how much I love her. The other people I love, the ones I worry about in quiet moments, will have to keep fighting their demons while I watch from the sidelines, my insides thick with longing to comfort them.

But I can keep on singing, loving them through their storms, listening to their wails, holding them tight in my heart and lifting their names to the Savior who once cried in His own mother’s arms.

You whom I love ― you people, you institutions, you nation ― I sing for you. I pray for you. I give to you not birds nor billygoats but my hands and heart, whatever they’re worth.

And I will wait, breathless with hope, until the day the magic happens and you look up, heartache healed, and start to sing.

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“Hush, Little Baby” was probably written in the southern U.S. sometime in the early 1900’s, but the Internet is uncertain on the details. It’s been performed by artists from Burl Ives to Regina Spektor to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and been woven into songs by Bo Diddley, James Taylor, and Eminem.

If Rover doesn’t bark, Mama’s supposed to buy her child a horse and cart. I have to say, Mama not only has a lot of excess spending cash, she also has some really questionable parenting methods.

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I never figured out why my darling granddaughter was crying. Whatever the reason, she forgave me and, as far as I can tell, wants me to come back next week. I will happily oblige.

If you think someone you know might enjoy this blog, I’d be honored if you would share it with them.

I have mentioned in past posts that I’m trying to write a book. (I can hear my friend and mentor admonishing me to say “writing a book,” not “trying to write,” but the trying feels so much bigger than the writing.) I’m still plugging away at it, writing and researching and doubting and writing some more. It’s a bigger haul than I could have ever imagined, and I have miles to go before I sleep. If you’d like to know more, I describe what sparked the book on the My Big Project page of my author website, juliejriddle.com.

Come on, now, try telling me this ain't the cutest little face on the planet.

Make Your Mark: Or, why ghosts like spray paint

I discovered the ghosts by accident.

I was somewhere south of Adrian, Michigan, clearing my brain after a court hearing in a murder case I’m following. Nothing much happened at the hearing, but the day still seemed to call for a little back-country therapy. As is often my goal on such occasions, I intentionally got myself as lost as possible, reveling in the woods and fields and occasional cow.

I was getting ready to turn right when a quick peek at Google Maps informed me that, if I turned the other way, I’d reach something called the Haunted Trestle. I turned left, of course, and In short order I found myself facing a railroad overpass slathered in color.

The place has obviously been a go-to destination for teens for decades, if not generations. Thick layers of spray paint cover every inch of the cement and steel structure, words and simple drawings and squiggles layered atop one another in a glorious explosion of self-expression. In several places, the paint peels back, revealing another — and then another — layer, colors upon colors upon colors.

(A side note, here: My 45 seconds of online research indicates the overpass isn’t actually a trestle. But I’m going to call it that. Who am I to argue with Google Maps?)

Some of the spray-painted words are vulgar. Some are encouraging. Initials in hearts ache with young love, and oversized letters exclaim the name of their painter. Other letters and scribbles and swirls mean nothing to anyone except the person who brought them to life with the swoosh of a paint can — the artist who, for that frozen moment, joined the throng that came before and made their mark.

I don’t know the backstory of the hauntedness of the trestle. I could probably look it up, but, at least for the moment, I don’t think I want to know.

To me, the ghosts hovering about that remote, quiet place in the middle of nowhere are the young painters — it must be hundreds of them, over years and years — yearning to matter, to be seen, to believe they belong and have a place on life’s canvas. 

A weedy pulloff just north of the trestle fits exactly one vehicle. Scrabbly but functional paths, worn by many feet, lead from the road up to the top of the trestle, where the ghosts laugh and drink cheap beer and lie on the tracks to feel brave and wonder what lies ahead for them. Next to the tracks, standing sentinel above the colored wall, a white pipe juts up from the gravel, probably with some purpose or another. 

Red paint forms block letters wrapped around the pipe:

WE

BE

HERE

Yes, they be. They be here, those young people full of fear and hope. They be here, hidden under the layers of all that came after, their glory days long forgotten in the hustle of adulthood and jobs and family and old age. New artists have swarmed in, made their mark, obliterated what came before. But it’s still there. It formed the foundation for what was to come, laying down color that made other scribbles and scrawls all the richer.

My worries and accomplishments and to-do lists all seem so big when I look at them from the inside, where I and my brief span are all I can really see. But every once in a while time opens herself up like a hillside of maples and you realize how many, how many, how many people came before, and how many will come after, and how infinitely, infinitely, infinitely small you are, and how your life is only a whisper in the fall wind.

I don’t want to live forever. Not in my body, and not in people’s memories, either. When my time here is done, I’m happy to cede the floor to the next round of humans ready to make their own mark, live their own lives, scrawl their own to-do lists and wonder if they matter.

But I be here now. And what I do lays a foundation for what comes after.

My kind word smooths the surface. My encouragement covers over anger and insult. My squiggle that’s just for me makes someone else braver, more ready to make a mark of their own.

I’m haunted by the hurt I see in the world and my inability to do anything about it. The problems and trauma and injustices and barriers are so layered and complex and inextricable from one another, nobody can fix it all. I walk past Valerie in her spot on the sidewalk outside the post office and I slip her a few dollars and inwardly writhe in shame because I don’t know how to change her life.

But mine is not the only paint can. I’m not an artist in the night, commissioned to create a Work of Greatness. I am infinitely small, and so are you. But I’ll make my little mark, and you make your little mark, and together we’ll create a layer on which others will build, 

and build, 

and build.

Maybe on this Halloween night, a car will roll to a stop in the little parking spot at the foot of the trestle, and a group of giddy teens will tumble out, paint cans in hand. I hope so. Contribute to the tapestry, you who are bursting with life and big dreams. Paint with abandon, you who don’t know if your little bit matters

It does.

Make your mark.

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I said I don’t want to know the trestle’s backstory, but I kinda do. I just don’t want to look it up online. If someone knows the actual story, for goodness’ sake, share it with us in the comments section.

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After I left the trestle, I found myself in the small town of Hudson, a little south of Jackson. There I discovered, to my utter delight, that a restaurant named Rumors (it’s right on the main drag, you can’t miss it) installed a tiny little house in a former vent in the front of the building. If you lie down on your stomach on the sidewalk and look inside, you can spend the best five minutes of your week looking through the windows. It made me incredibly happy.

Apparently the restaurant also has other tiny objects hidden around the inside of the restaurant, including one nobody has ever found. It was closed when I was there, but I’ll definitely be back.

The town also boasts a museum which, according to a sign on its door, is “One of the finest museums one could find for a town our size in Michigan,” and “A good place where kids can see interesting things.”

I’m a pretty big fan of Hudson.

Missiles, Milton, and my Moto G

Clumsy people shouldn’t carry naked phones.

When my Moto G Stylus declared itself No Longer Functional a while back, I found myself in possession of a brand spankin’ new phone (the Moto G Stylus 5G 2024!) with a lovely, uber-touchable back that made me think maybe I’d try going phone-commando. Then I nearly dropped it and started surfing for cases.

Usually I’m a basic-black kind of girl when it comes to phone attire. But this time, I decided to jazz up my life a little. After a properly obsessive online search, I found and fell in love with a case on Etsy, the digital marketplace that unites creative, make-cool-things types with people who want to own handcrafted goods.

It’s a lovely case, at least according to the picture. I haven’t seen the real deal yet, despite ordering it, gosh, maybe three, four weeks ago? The seller and I messaged back and forth for a while as he took pains to get my personalized order just the way I wanted it. His name is Georgiy Ivanenko. He lives in Cherkasy, Ukraine, a river city of about 300,000 people, home to government buildings, museums, parks, cultural treasures, and the occasional Russian missile explosion. The residents go to work and cook dinner and make cell phone cases in between air raid sirens. Meanwhile, they carve out energy and emotional space to care for the 80,000 displaced people who have moved into the region not knowing if they’ll ever return home.

In his last message to me, Georgiy wrote, “Have a good life and stay healthy!”

He apologized that the phone case might take some time to reach me. With Ukraine airports destroyed by Russia, packages first have to travel by truck or train to Poland before being flown to a Florida warehouse for distribution in North America. The package should reach Florida around October 10, he said.

October 10…right about the time another package was scheduled to arrive in Florida, one in the form of a Category 5 hurricane. 

The state still reeled from Hurricane Helene, the monster that swept across the southeast U.S. two weeks earlier, killing more than 200 people, eviscerating whole communities and devastating lives. Now Milton was on his way, bigger and badder than any storm in recent memory, ready to take down anyone Helene left standing.

The day after news reports blared news of Milton’s aftermath ― three million without power, more than a dozen dead, people clinging to debris in the water ― I got a ping on my phone. My package had arrived at a Florida shipping facility, and it was now on its way north to my Michigan home, the cheery notification said.

People lost everything. And somehow, someone still managed to send me my phone case.

I don’t even know what to do with that.

I can tell you one thing, though. When the case arrives, I’m going to take a minute to just hold it and think about the places it’s been. The hands that have touched it. The lives through which it has passed and the people eking out an existence in the most trying of circumstances…and not giving up.

The design I chose for the case, back before I messaged Georgiy, before the hurricanes started swirling toward our coasts, is a spray of ivy engraved on wood. After a summer watching never-say-die vines creeping up the side of my house, ivy speaks to me of resilience. Tenacity. Fortitude.

Amid the vines on the case, I requested another personalization, a reference to a Bible verse that’s been on my heart lately: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

I grow weary as I look at the world around me. There’s so much hurt. So much injustice. So much meanness and pettiness and pride, flooding everywhere, destroying lives. I want it all to just go away and let me enjoy my new phone case without having to worry about things that should be better and my place in fixing them.

When things get tough, you just keep going. You hunker in the bomb shelter and then go back to making a casserole for your neighbors. You dig through the muck and bring water to the people up the road. You just…keep going.

You keep going, making one difference for one person in one moment. Speaking up for what’s right. Seeking the other side of the story. Seeing what you don’t want to see, because someone has to see it. Taking one step.

It's OK to be weary. But keep going.

Because someone needs you.

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I can’t begin to imagine the trauma of having your life wiped away in the space of a day. If you feel compelled to donate your time or resources to help with hurricane relief efforts, please do. I’m sure many organizations across the nation would welcome and make good use your gift. If you don’t want to research to find a legitimate donation site, you can safely donate via LCMS Disaster Response, operated by my church body.

The white rock in the garden

Rizzo only had four days to change everything.

It was enough.

Adopting a kitten wasn’t the plan when we walked into the animal shelter. But a white and gray fuzzball in an upper cage caught our attention and wouldn’t let it go, and we found ourselves driving home with a gently mewing box in the back seat.

Our spare bedroom became the kitten’s personal castle, a temporary holding space until we could properly introduce her to our other cats. We snuck into the room as often as we could to visit Her Tininess. She’d uncurl from her perch on the lowest shelf of the bookshelf and toddle to the door, looking up expectantly. Small enough to fit curled in one hand, she was self-assured and fearless, clambering confidently over our legs and snuggling into our laps with a mighty purr. She liked me well enough, but she adored my husband, and the feeling was mutual.

Utterly captivated, we gushed over what a great addition to the family she’d be and daydreamed about watching her grow up.

On Sunday evening, we noticed she was breathing a little heavily. The fireworks our neighbors were shooting off probably scared her, we said.

The next morning was Labor day.

She was worse.

We chose her name at the emergency vet’s office. We’d been weighing options since we brought her home but couldn’t decide on one until we had to fill out a form for the worried-looking lady behind the desk. “Rizzo,” we wrote. Rizzo, like from the movie “Grease” – the tough girl with a soft side.

She’d need to be tough to get past the pneumonia crackling in her lungs, the vet said, his face grave. We took her home, gave her the medication he prescribed, and got her to eat a little. Maybe she’ll be OK, we told each other as our small kitten struggled more by the minute to draw in air.

She wasn’t OK. Rizzo died about 1 a.m. as her favorite human stroked her fur and wept.

We buried her in the garden outside the window where he sits with his coffee in the mornings and where our other cats watch over the bird feeders. We look out sometimes at the white rock that marks the spot, and we mist up and reach for a Kleenex.

It’s nonsense, in a way, grieving for a creature we barely knew, who flitted into our lives for such a short time.

But grief doesn’t follow the rules of logic any more than love does. Maybe a Real Grownup doesn’t cry over a kitten. But I do. Putting that sweet animal in a hole in the ground broke my heart, and I miss her, and I’m sad.

Four days after our little makeshift funeral, a headline made my heart lurch. School shooting. Four dead. Another bullied boy got his hands on a semiautomatic rifle.

Good Lord, no. Not again.

More families devastated with loss. Loss of peace. Loss of trust. Loss of a husband. A wife. A child.

More blood on a school floor.

And still that white rock sits in the garden, still it makes me need a tissue.

I’m a fool, I tell myself, for mourning a cat while bullets roar and the world reels with pain. How dare I cry over such triviality. How dare I be so selfish.

But, no.

It’s not selfish to hurt my own little hurt. The God who made kittens doesn’t put limits on who gets to be sad.

…Some sadness ought to make us mad, though.

My sorrow over the loss of our little Rizzo made my hands and feet restless, so I launched into a home remodeling project we’ve been putting off. I couldn’t just sit still and grieve. I needed to turn my sadness into action. 

A child pointing a gun at other children and pulling the trigger ought to make us sad. We ought to go through cases of tissues in the face of such tragedy. Horrifyingly, we hardly gasp when it happens any more, let alone shed tears.

But unless our collective sorrow rekindles and boils into anger that leads to action, how will school shootings ever stop?

We don’t dare close our hearts, calling such horror a fact of life that we’re helpless to change. We should be aching with sadness. We should be raging with anger. And our hands and feet should itch to DO something.

No, most of us can’t pass legislation or start movements. But we can ask if the schools in our town have mental health help for struggling kids. We can vote for politicians who propose safety measures we think will work. We can donate to programs that strengthen families and protect children. We can volunteer as a Big Brother or Big Sister and ask our neighbor if they need a hand with the kids. We can lock up our damn guns.

A white rock in the garden reminds me that, for four days, a little bundle of sweetness made my life a little brighter.

I hope it can also nudge me to look for ways I can brighten other lives and strengthen other homes. Maybe my hands and feet can do some good. Maybe some action I take will help a hurting child believe he doesn’t need to pick up a weapon.

We can never truly know the positive impact our actions have. But we sure as hell aren't going to make anything better by shrugging and doing nothing.

Small fingers and an imperfect world

Well, little girl, what do you think of the world so far?

It’s been one week since you arrived and made everything better. Everyone said grandbabies grab your heart in a hurry, and, boy, were they right. You sucked me right in with your tiny hands and miniature ears and eyes that occasionally pop open, dark and intense, before you drift back to sleep.

In that dim hospital room, one week ago, you rested your fuzz-topped head in the crook of my arm. Your lips twitched and your little eyebrows scrunched as you slept, seeming to dream baby dreams ― of what? Of worlds beyond this one, which you have barely begun to explore?

You cried a little, in this first week, and sometimes gazed contemplatively at your mother’s face or squawked when your dad changed your diaper. But mostly you slept, peacefully, deeply, as only new babies can. Slept, at peace, never once worrying about the future.

I think about it, though.

I think about what lies ahead for you. The hurdles that will stand in your path. The messes you will have to clean, even though you didn’t make them. The mistakes we adults have made for which you will have to pay.

I look at headlines and statistics and I want to grab you, hold you close, somehow keep you small and safe. People aren’t nice to each other out there in the big world, little one. They scream and claw and ridicule without thought. They will criticize you behind walls of digital anonymity. They will shame you. Film commercials to tell you you’re not pretty. Create rules that say you’re not good enough, you don’t try hard enough, it’s your fault.

You will see horrible things, out there in the world. You will see excess glorified and compassion crushed. You will watch adults act like children and children look around them, bewildered by a world so imperfect.

But don't be afraid, sweet girl.

No, this life to which you have come is not perfect. Not by a long shot.

But, darling child, it’s still worth living, I promise. Just wait til you see all the good that’s out there, too.

In between the cruelty, there’s so much kindness. Meanness is loud, but gentleness is resilient. Humility hums below all the pride — listen carefully, sweetheart, and you’ll hear it.

With every calamity comes a surge of warm hearts and giving hands and open doors. People try — oh, how they try, striving and fighting forward and giving it all they’ve got — you’ll see how beautiful it is, how they try. And they want a good world, at least most of them do. They want to take care of the hurting and fix problems. They want love to win.

I sat and watched you as you slept on your dad’s chest a few days after you were born. Your fingers, no bigger than matchsticks, stretched their so-small muscles, reaching for you-knew-not-what.

I placed my finger in your palm and you wrapped those tiny fingers around mine, and I would have done anything for you. I would fight back every demon and charge through the world with a broom and a shovel, sweeping aside all that could make your heart sad and burying that which could stand in your path.

But you don’t need me to fix the world for you, this back-and-forth world that’s so bad and so good. You’ll go out into it and make your mark and do your bit and find your place and make it better, just by being in it.

In the meantime, sweetpea, I’m going to hold you while I can and gaze at that nose that twitches in your sleep, and I’m going to daydream of bedtime stories and soccer games and graduations and you, this child of my child, being and becoming.

And I’m going to look at the big world that surrounds us both — sometimes scary, sometimes breathtaking — and gather my strength and do my utmost to make some tiny piece of it better.

With these small fingers wrapped around my heart, what else can I do?

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Dear reader, please join me in welcoming my first grandchild, Aspen Riddle. I’m happy to report that she is the cutest infant in the history of humanity.

Thanks for helping me make a better world for her.

Unstoppable

We’ve got a nice garden going this year, but by far the most interesting plant to watch this spring has been the volunteer ivy that has commandeered a dirt patch just behind our house.

I’m the weed-puller in our family (the husband plants plants; I kill ‘em), and I noticed the ivy during my post-winter cleanup spree a while back. It was little at the time, only a few dainty strands stretching up from under some rocks. They were pretty, so I left them alone.

Besides, I thought, how much trouble could one or two little vines be?

Fast forward a month or two, and that patch of dirt is buried beneath a luxurious mat of ivy, green and thick and invincible. The stuff is everywhere. I’d swear it grows a foot a day and sends out new shoots like it’s Spider-Man. (I’m not entirely sure what that means, TBH, but the image works for me.)

Yeah, I should have yanked it, either when I first saw it or when I realized it was trying to take over the world. But I’ve left it alone, even though it’s creeping between siding and up the water spout and snaking one suspicious arm toward the back door.

I can't pull it because ivy is so dang cool. Nothing stands between that plant and growth. Put a rock on it? It’ll wriggle its way out. Put a wall in front of it, it climbs straight up the side. Give it a stake or a shepherd’s hook or another plant incautiously draping one arm in the ivy’s general direction and up it goes, fast as a whip, wrapping and swirling and tangling and looking all innocent until you realize it’s inching its way — quickly! — toward your ankle.

Nothing stops ivy. It just keeps going, no matter what’s in its path.

Man, I admire that.

I like to think of myself as a no-nonsense go-getter who lets nothing slow her down, not when she really believes in something. I even have a necklace engraved with “Unstoppable” and that great, inspirational Bible verse, Philippians 4:13: I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.

Trouble is, I’m totally stoppable. I stop all the time, even when I really, really care about something and really, really believe in it.

Maybe I’m just chicken. Maybe I lack the courage to stand behind my convictions and let fear of failure — or of hard work, or of getting laughed at or yelled at or despised — knock me down without even putting up a real fight.

Or maybe I’m lazy, and when the going gets tough, I realize I’d rather have a bowl of ice cream and watch “Everybody Loves Raymond” reruns.

I think both of those things are true, not that I’m proud of that.

I also think humans aren’t ivy.

We have awesome, human brains that let us think lofty thoughts and have ideas that move us to action. We feel compassion and idealism and pride and love, and we get all riled up and ready to Change The World.

But so often we hit obstacles and, wham, those ideas and ambitions go out the window while our human brains go every which way except the ivy way. We do everything except just keep going, no matter what.

In some ways, that’s a good thing. Sometimes plodding forward at all costs is the wrong move. Stubbornly moving toward the goal you set or adhering to the decision you made can have devastatingly bad consequences.

But there’s a lot to be said for the ivy way. Ivy vines don’t barge through obstacles; they go around them. They don’t have an intended course; they just grow, reaching as far as they can, however they can get there. And they don’t try to go it alone. They branch off, create new, multiply, share the job of reaching, reaching, reaching wherever their roots send them.

I have work I want to do in this world. I’m not sure what that work is going to look like by the time I’m done with it. I just know I have this stirring inside that says, “Go. Do.” 

I’m going to run into a heck of a lot of obstacles, getting wherever it is I’m going. And I’m going to be scared and lazy and stoppable. But maybe I can keep going anyway. Maybe I can keep my feet rooted in the stuff that stirs my soul and just see what happens. And maybe I can remember I’m not alone, and that all around me, hearts are yearning and minds are straining and fellow travelers are reaching, reaching, destinationless but determined.

And as I reach, maybe I can remember the One who is reaching for me, reaching, yearning, straining, climbing around every obstacle to tap me on the soul and say, “I love you, I love you, I love you, you silly, stoppable thing.”

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go make sure the back yard ivy hasn’t figured out how to get into the house.

It’s unstoppable like that.

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I used Google Lens to try to identify our yard ivy but couldn’t. If you recognize it and can tell me what it’s called, I’d love to hear from you.

I also have potted indoor ivy that’s currently growing up a window near my desk. I’m a little afraid of it.

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For those of you who read my last blog post: I ran into Hugo Davies again yesterday. He says hi.

If you know someone who might appreciate reading blog posts about cats and ivy and being better humans and whatnot, I’d be honored if you’d share this with them. Share your email in the signup box below to receive notifications when I post something new, which is weeklyish, or email me at julie.j.riddle@gmail.com. I’d like to hear from you.

Wanted

I wasn’t expecting to make a new friend the day I met Hugo Davies.

I was engrossed in my latest book during a walk in my neighborhood when a hearty “Mrrrrow!” caught my attention. Putting the book down, I discovered a jaunty white and brown cat trotting toward me purposefully.

I occasionally see animals of various sorts on my walks, but none, despite my coaxing, ever give me the time of day. This cat, though, had Definite Intention as he trotted the distance between us, looking me in the eye and meowing loudly as he came.

Obviously, this cat had been expecting me. I sat down on the sidewalk to say hello. Without missing a beat, the cat climbed onto my lap, circled a few times with his motor running full-throttle, and plopped in a heap on my legs with all the contentment of belonging.

“HUGO DAVIES,” read one of several tags dangling from his collar. “DO NOT FEED” and “I HAVE A HOME,” said another. A third provided several phone numbers, although they were tough to read, what with Hugo repeatedly rolling over for belly pats.

I spent a good five minutes chatting with my new buddy before wishing him well and continuing on my walk.

That was a month or so ago. In the intervening days, I looked for Hugo on my walks but never ran into him. Until last week, that is. Again, to my delight, he greeted me with a robust meow and a purposeful trot and a purr-powered lap-plop.

It was wonderful to see him. And it was wonderful how happy he seemed to see me.

Now, I'm a sensible human, and I know I’m not special to Hugo. I’m just the human he happened to encounter on the sidewalk when he was in the mood for some attention.

In a way, though, that makes his warm welcome all the more endearing.

Hugo didn’t demand that I pass inspection before he welcomed me into his cat world. He didn’t need me to prove that I’m nice, or that my lap is soft, or that I’m a good petter. He didn’t pick me because of who I am, or in spite of who I am. He just said, in his cat way, “I choose you, no matter who you are.”

It’s nice to be wanted just because you’re wanted.

Last week, I got to interview a music therapist who works with justice-involved teenagers, most of them still struggling with significant childhood trauma. When the therapist meets with the teens, they often come to him angry and afraid, sometimes yelling, sometimes worse.

He doesn’t make them listen to sunshiney songs and tell them to be happy, the therapist said. Instead, he yells with them. He listens with them to angry, hurting music that matches what they are feeling. He helps them write their own music where they can put their hurt and their fear, and he records their pounding, angry rap songs that let them give voice to the burdens they carry: “I done lost so many of my friends my pain runnin’ deep / I’mma go all in with this money, Momma / cause we ain’t have nowhere to sleep.”

You have to meet people where they are, the therapist said.

I thought of that as Hugo sat on my lap, not demanding I be anything other than a human on the sidewalk.

How often, I wondered, might we open doors and change hearts and start on a path toward healing, just by meeting people where they are?

I don’t always understand people who are different from me. But maybe I don’t have to understand them to look them in the eye, show them I care, and welcome them into my life.

Maybe that looks like saying hello to someone whose clothes or music or skin color are different from mine.

Maybe it looks like using a pronoun that’s uncomfortable in my mouth because it helps someone feel less alone in the world.

Maybe it means being angry alongside someone, or being sad with them, or not having all the answers but being there to listen.

Or maybe it just means letting the people I care about see that I love them and want them in my life, unconditionally.

Since my latest encounter with Hugo, I’ve taken several walks, each time hoping I’ll see his fuzzy head and hear his demanding meow as he trots toward me like he couldn’t be happier to see me. I love being wanted, even if it’s by a cat. And I love not having to earn affection, because I’m often not convinced I deserve it.

Few stories in the Bible get me as choked up as the parable of the Prodigal Son, the rogue who makes all the wrong decisions and watches in despair as his life goes haywire. He turns reluctant feet toward home, knowing he deserves nothing but a boot to the tail end.

Looking up as he nears home, heart clutched in fear and sorrow, he sees his dad – not with his arms crossed in anger, not standing and waiting at the gate, but running, coat flapping, arms outstretched, running with all his might to grab his son and wrap him in his arms and cry on his shoulder and say to that undeserving boy, “My child, my child. I love you so.”

On this Father’s Day, my heart leans in weary sobs on my Father’s shoulder, wrapped in the comfort of His welcome, overwhelmed by his acceptance.

I know my insides, and I know He knows them, too, and I know I haven’t earned those feet that race to me and tell me I’m wanted.

Love isn’t about earning. Love is just love. Love is Hugo demanding a lap. Love is a Father’s arms wrapping me in forgiveness. And love is me showing the people around me they are wanted, just exactly as they are.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go take a walk. There’s this cat who can’t wait to see me, and I don’t want to let him down.