Reassurance about the here and now

July 25, 2002

Dear Julie,

In a production of the play "I Remember Mama" I just saw, the family's Mama sits at the kitchen table paying the bills and tells her children the rest of the money is going into the bank account. Anybody can tell they are just getting by. When a substantial sum does come to the family at the end of the play, Mama is forced to admit to her children that there never was any bank account.

She just wanted them to feel secure.

Most people require reassurance about the hereafter, but someone who reassures you about the here and now wins the heart.

All mothers want to give their children that. Unconditional love is all it is, but that "all" belongs in italics. Unconditional is the love God has for us. It is the love we strive for and so often fall short of.

I think of life on earth as a cauldron where the gold of our beings is heated by experience until the impurities eventually melt away. None of us is capable of being perfect at anything. All of us are capable of doing the best we can.

Life and death continue to make us toss and turn at Amity Hills Farm. A new donkey was born Monday morning, the second of the summer. We lost another puppy that same night.

Great Pyrenees aren't always the best of mothers, we are told. As "The Jerry Springer Show" attests, parenting doesn't necessarily come naturally to everyone.

Mickey, the puppies' mother, had moved the four remaining puppies out of the shed to a shaded spot below one of the porches on the house. DC saw them there squirming when she fed the animals at sundown. When she heard thunder close to midnight, DC insisted we drive out to the farm and move the puppies back under the shelter of the shed.

Mickey was in the shed when we arrived. The puppies were still by the porch. One of them was lying by itself off to the side, its squirming done this lifetime.

DC has decided we should bottle-feed the puppies ourselves in case they are dying because there isn't enough of Mickey to go around. Our veterinarian thinks we might need to confine Mickey so she stays with them. Worms can kill puppies, she also said, so they're taking medicine.

I try to reassure DC that everything works out right, but I don't think she believes me. She scares easily and isn't always sure God is on our side.

She wants security for the animals in our lives, though she's beginning to realize that a farm is more like a jungle than a real-life version of "Babe." I try to reassure her, but she doesn't trust nature will take care of its own. She wants guarantees. Failing that, she takes steps.

We took Dandy, the deaf farm dog, to the vet yesterday because he has a tumor on his eye. DC worries over the animal like one of the hens in the barn. She has vowed that not another puppy will die.

If we ever had our own farm, she says, maybe we should just stick to plants.

In the play, the family's youngest must be rushed to the hospital for a mastoid operation on her ear. My mother had the same operation as the child. The doctor tells Mama it must be performed immediately. Funny, my mother never told us how serious that operation was.

Love, Sam

Sam Blackwell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.