VALADIE ARCHIVES
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`I have no doubt we’re blessed ones’
By George Valadie
December 9, 2011
    “How’s your face doing?”
    It’s an odd question — unless you live in our house.
    Actually, I’m asked fairly frequently by my family as they know I have an ongoing medical condition known as trigeminal neuralgia. And when it does what it can sometimes do, believe me, it attracts my full attention.
    Some five years ago I was enjoying a burger when a quite unexpected and shock of a pain set fire to my right upper lip. The lightning strike bolted across my cheek stopping just short of my eye. I had no memory of anything like it before and I’ve broken a few bones in my day.
    I came to realize it was most often brought on by chewing. Razor sharp and only on the surface, it didn’t take many of those before I was seriously considering giving up all food.
    But there were times I found myself wincing with toothbrush in hand, or doing nothing more than talking. I nearly pinched off a piece of a wooden podium once as I stood before our student body. Funny I don’t recall what I spoke about though.
    At times, perfectly healthy, but increasingly not, there were several missteps as I hunted for an accurate explanation.
    Once, becoming ever more desperate, I (with all my vast medical training) was convinced I had narrowed the cause to a single problematic tooth and begged my dentist to pull it which would also require a bridge replacement. The tooth was pulled, the bridge was inserted and the pain continued.
    Then it was on to the next wrong idea.
    The peace of an answer came in the initial five minutes of my first ever appointment with a brain surgeon. He cleared up the puzzle and I eventually narrowed down my two preferable options – the first being what seems like the most miraculous drug ever. And should that waffle out, we will make a date for what will also be my first-ever brain surgery.
    So everyone kindly checks in on the condition of my face. And thankfully, all news has been good.
    Nancy and I were eating lunch when this “health in our fifties” jag became the topic. She’s had her own challenges. Brain surgery or not, I’d lose every contest of “I can top that” when she brings out the “birthing three babies” card.
    But she’s also had two artificial hips installed along the way and some recent knee pain. With cane in hand, she recently limped in to see her orthopedist for a check-up hoping all that hip titanium was still connected and that no human-made knee parts would need to be added to her God-made ones.
    I was amazed at how quickly she perked up when the good-looking doc walked in but still, she couldn’t hide a “mild case of arthritis.” His suggestion was a five-injection infusion of rooster comb. I kid you not. And yes, rooster comb is exactly what it sounds like.
    She’s been feeling much better, the cane’s been retired and as you would expect, she’s begun waking up earlier.
    On the topic of health-challenges, we can also claim one daughter who can’t seem to shake her headaches while the other two battle Crohn’s disease.
    As a result, each of their diets is evolving as they learn the effects of Diet Coke with its aspartame and everything else with its glutens. I haven’t studied either but you learn quickly if it causes you pain.
    Throw in two cataract surgeries and a gall bladder removal in our family of five and the two of us sat there questioning what sort of absurd combination of genetic gifts we had combined to produce and pass on.
    But as she usually does, Nancy summed it up perfectly, “But we’re still excited to be here!”
    Indeed we are! Indeed we are!
    My guess is there are few families, if any, who can’t tell some version of a story similar to ours, except many of theirs would be far worse.
    We’re on the wimpy end of the spectrum. We haven’t lost any of our five. We don’t have Alzeheimer’s. We’re not on any life-and-death transplant list. And we don’t have a child at St. Jude’s. And that’s not all that can beset a family. There are other trials people must endure that have nothing to do with physical ailments?
    Schools upon schools, ours included, are collecting what they can to aid the hungry, the homeless and those angelic little faces who innocently believe in the magic of a     Santa who will come no matter what.
    In this season of need, there are so many people with their hands held out, so many Santas ringing bells, so many chances to make a little extra room in our inn.
    In this season of preparing for he who came only to serve, in this life of “there but for the grace of God,” I have no doubt we are the blessed ones. Indeed we are!
    Dear God — It’s the human condition that we can get lost in ourselves, it’s just not humanity at our best. Please bless all those others who get forgotten. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Please deliver strength, hope to daily decisions
By George Valadie
November 11, 2011
We were there in our living room, with Sarah, our youngest, each of us enjoying a “one neuron” night.
You know, one of those where dinner is over, you’re settled in for nightfall and you find yourself lost in the worthlessness of Facebook, “angry birds” or the latest reality show. All in all, wasted minutes on the clock, where the human brain might not be called upon to fire off much more than a single neuron, if that.
Then with a bit of surprise in her voice, Nancy blurted out, “There it is. That’s the first Christmas commercial I’ve seen.”
The commercial that grabbed her attention – and then my daughter’s — was an advertisement for a little kid’s toy zoo.
“Oh, look at that, Sarah. I love that, it’s so cute. I think I’ll get that for Brady,” he being the family’s only grandson and designated crowned prince.
Designed for little gremlins of the world, it is a plastic collection of colors, sights and sounds complete with zoo-goers, tree-top homes and smiling animals that all live in peace while sliding down the same waterfall slide.
“Oh, no,” replied Sarah, Brady’s aunt, “I want to be the one to get that for him. I want to get him something good for a change. Do you think I can put that on lay-away?”
“For a change” is Sarah’s way of acknowledging she traditionally has little money and saves less. And since she’d never heard of lay-away until stores brought it out of retirement a few weeks ago, she sees hope if they’ll accept her $1.50 a week.
More of an on-line shopper than she used to be, still Nancy can’t see, touch or sniff items from her recliner. So experience has taught her that before she takes another click out of our credit card, she’s wise to take advantage of customer comments on the web. So across the room from one another, the two of them browsed, discussed and interrupted my evening of reality TV.
Listen to this one, Nancy said: “Highly disappointed in the picture on the box of the monkey in the swing which is not even available. I understand you have a disclaimer but it is misleading to not let them know that the monkey is not even available ….”
Here’s one: “I had thought I had ordered the larger set … similarly named … and though the illustration shows a monkey, mine came with a gorilla instead … I don’t seem able to buy the monkey separately ….”
Another: “We are really disappointed … the zoo came with three animals. One animal wasn’t even the monkey that was on the box … my daughter loves playing with this but I don’t know any zoo that has only three animals … I thought I had the monkey which is pictured in several places on the box ….”
And finally: “I’m hoping (the company) makes the monkey available … since the gorilla came with the set and is also sold separately ….”
I won’t lie, by this time, I was wishing the monkey, the gorilla and the entire zoo of critters would escape never to be found again. I’m not laughing at nor criticizing the company. OK, well maybe they should have put the darn monkey in the box.
But to me, the truly bothersome issue is that these thoughts reflect the sorts of goofy things on which far too many of us will focus as we prep for the holidays that lay ahead. Me, too.
Just a day or so ago, as we were driving to do some shopping of the up-close-and-personal variety, Nancy mused in a much different direction:
“You know, I used to love it when my family got together at my parents during the holidays. Mother and Daddy, my sisters, you, me, all the kids. We laughed and talked and ate. It was so much fun. I miss all that when I think about it.
“But it also occurs to me that one of those times – and I don’t remember which one – one of those was the last time. We just didn’t know it was the last time.
“I don’t even know what happened, somebody moved or couldn’t travel or something, but life changed and for some reason we couldn’t or didn’t ever gather that way again. Of course, you wouldn’t have wanted to have known you were celebrating the last such holiday. That would’ve been too sad.
“But it sure does make you want to cherish the ones you do have.”
If you’ve mistakenly gotten the idea that all Valadie holidays have been a blast, well, we have attended our share of family gatherings where, in a manner of speaking, cute little monkeys unexpectedly evolved into gorillas gone wild. And after all, who can’t recall such a tale of their own?
Let’s be honest, we’re not always excited about the trips we have to make. We don’t always enjoy that same bland casserole that shows up year after year, or the same old jokes and stories that have been told more often than that. Heck, we don’t even like all the family members that bring that stuff.
But love them, hate them, either way, there will come a holiday gathering that is the last. So we want all that stuff to be perfect. But maybe this year, we can enjoy the imperfections as well — theirs and ours and the irritating little monkeys of our lives.
Dear God — There’s still time to plan for what matters, not that the rest of it can’t be fun too. Please bless the people for whom we do all that. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Family at Mass opens door for reflection
By George Valadie
October 28, 2011
     There they were. One of the more well-dressed, well groomed, cutest little families in our church. I don’t know their names nor did I recognize their faces.
     There was mom sitting on the far right, looking incredibly put-together for the mother of three young boys. She seemed calm and glowing, peaceful even. Not a sign anywhere of the weekly pre-Mass conflicts I remember in our home, the sort where clothes and breakfast and even underwear were topics of debate.
     My weekly contribution to the home front battles were something akin to, “OK girls, if we can all behave this week, we’ll go get a treat at the 7-11. Now go put your undies on.”
     But for this mom, I could picture her having magically said “eat this” and “wear that” – and they probably did.
     She sat there swaying gently with their latest family addition in her lap. From my vantage point, this littlest guy was not only cute but quiet – on every end. This near perfect angel never needed burping, changing or plugging.
     On her left was dad, equally calm and put together. No static-cling socks hanging off his shirt or leaking out from underneath his pants leg. Hair combed, belt through all the loops, all tags removed – the ones that come attached to your new clothes. And yes, I have appeared in public wearing all of those.
     To his left was the eldest of their three, a really handsome young lad who looked to be about 11 years old. And the third of the three youngsters, on the far left, was about five.
     Surprisingly, they had chosen the fourth pew from the altar. Our family would have never ventured that far forward even on our best day. Such a choice would have likely resulted in an even longer walk of shame to the exit, in the event something or someone went awry during Mass. As they often did.
     In a church that offers the Holy Family as a model for us all, this group seemed to be well on their way.
     However, just before the reading of the Gospel, our pastor stepped to the front of the altar and invited the youngsters of our parish to come forward for a “children’s liturgy of the word.” Father announced that first through sixth grade students could come forward before stepping next door to our chapel where an adult volunteer would read a children’s version of Scripture and offer a similar version of the homily.
     The 11-year-old of this family was slowly leaning forward to take advantage. But as his weight was shifting to the balls of his feet, you could see him also sizing up his surroundings. I did the same and realized – as he had – that there weren’t really any others his age joining this procession.
     Slowly, he settled back into his seat, maybe even slinking down a bit. Dad saw it happening too.
     He gave his son a bit of a shoulder coax and a nod of the head. Even without words, his message was crystal clear. “Go on, son, you should go with them.”
     But the boy didn’t move leading dad to become much more animated. I caught his facial expressions as he seemed to be telling his son to get up and go. But Son #1 didn’t budge.
     Time was running out as the last of the little ones seemed to have arrived and the pastor was blessing all their little heads.
     Dad, ever more irritated, took his last shot when he clutched his son’s upper arm and with a whispered scream, “strongly encouraged” him to leave their pew. The scene reminded me of how we parents try to subtly kill our kids in any public place when you’re sure everyone’s watching. In this battle for a boy’s soul - Final score: Son 1,      Dad 0. Honestly, I did the exact same thing to my girls and can’t say that I still don’t try now and again. “You should do this or you should do that.” I’ve been that dad.
     But I also remember being 11. And I would have done the exact same thing the kid did. I can imagine myself holding my ground and taking my chances with whatever consequences awaited. I was that kid. No attention was the best attention.
     I don’t know why this dad wanted this son to go, but he did for what I will assume are only the best of intentions. Thinking back, I know there were times when I believed, like he had, that something valuable waited at the end of my nudge. But there were other times I just wanted them to be strong enough to stand up. Seemed that alone would be good for them.
     And on an occasion or two, more than I’d like to admit, all that “encouragement” I had offered was nothing more than me being guilty of that age-old sin of parental pride — the kind where all we really want is for those other parents to see our child stand up, stand out and march forward.
     It may have started with “You’ll love dance lessons,” then we moved along to “You’ll love softball,” and I think we wrapped it up with “You’ll love college.” Or maybe it was that I was the one who would love them being good at games, recitals and the family reputation.
     Nothing but a three-minute clip of another family’s life. But so much of our own came rushing back. Oh to try it again!
Dear God – Thank you for the chance with our three, the cost was high but the opportunity was priceless. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Please deliver strength, hope to daily decisions
By George Valadie
October 14, 2011
      I walked in the door and saw her sitting there, seemingly sad. Or mad, I couldn’t tell. Or maybe she was somewhere in between.
Oh dear, what had I done?
      Our after-work routines are consistently consistent if nothing else. When she leaves work, her afternoon route often includes a stop at the mall, the cleaners or the store, sometimes all three.
      She tries to get settled in her chair before the national news andusually has half her Sudoku puzzle penned in.
      When I leave school my car takes me straight home. Even when she’s asked me not to forget to run by the cleaners or the store or wherever she couldn’t.
      Oh dear, what had I forgotten to do? “Hey honey, you seem stressed, anything wrong?” I cautiously cringed.
     “I’m so mad,” she ripped back. “I went to the mall to get some new placemats for our table. And they had two kinds that looked alike except for one had pumpkins stitched into the middle while the other had turkeys.
     “They were perfect for our table. So I grabbed eight off the pumpkin pile. But at home I realized I had picked up three pumpkins and five turkeys. Can you believe they had turkeys in the pumpkin pile?”
     “I’m just so irritated.”
      I thought about offering a comforting, “Oh I can see how that would be horrible,” but I had little chance of sounding genuine and no chance of not laughing. So I went with the safer, “Well, turkeys are in season too, aren’t they, doesn’t seem that bad.”
     “Are you kidding me? You can’t mix those. I’m gonna get some other ones for       Thanksgiving but not yet. Not now”
      She punctuated her reply with the same sort of I-can’t-believe-you-don’t-know-this-stuff look my daughter has when she explains Facebook to me. “You’ll just never get it, will you.”
      Such is the annual arrival of autumn at the our house.
      And I could see where my Saturday was headed. Rather than settling in for College Game Day, we set out early to return the unwelcome turkey placemats. No problem, it turns out, glad to trade except for the fact they didn’t have any. “But the store across town is holding five for you.” Of course they are.
      And then we were off to shop for pumpkins and mums.
      We can’t grow either but we always have both. Encouragingly, we found a hefty-sized, perfectly shaped beauty at our first stop. Discouragingly, their mums didn’t cut it. Though I have yet to figure out what “it” is.
      We’re apparently adding a new touch this year as she also sprung for a handful of “accessorizing” pumpkins as she calls them. Picture those miniature, somewhat-deformed, ugly-duckling ones you’ve seen that you know no one will adopt.
      At the second pumpkin-and-mum store, their mums lacked the same “it” factor, but their pansies screamed her name. When did pansies get in the picture? I asked the same thing.
      As you might expect, our travels forced a stop to fuel up.
      I’m tickled Nancy handles our bill-paying so seldom do I question. But gasoline and dog food are supposed to be bought on a different credit card, the one not with us. “So go easy on the gas with this card,” she said. As if that made all the sense of pumpkins and turkeys being unable to live together.
      At our third stop, the mums failed miserably again. But new pumpkins unexplainably called her name.
     “What do you think?” she asked as she now considered one twice the size we already had in the car.
     “I think I got to buy 1.6 gallons of gas back there for the car I drive, that’s what I think.”
     “OK, we’ll take it,” she nodded to the farmer dragging his little Red Flyer wagon knowing he couldn’t carry it to the car.
      Which I think reduces the status of the first pumpkin we had bought to nothing more than that of an “accessorizing” pumpkin. Imagine how embarrassing that must be.
      Currently, we own two pots of pansies and 21 pumpkins if you include the prejudicial eight that can’t share table space with turkeys, but not a mum in sight – at least not yet.
      Is it all a waste? I don’t know, maybe so. I struggle to decide. Should we be saving our money? I’m sure we’ll wish we had.
      Sometimes it feels selfish and wasteful when we might rather be giving to the hungry and homeless. We worry about them, too.
      And then there are the farmers, the gardeners and even those store clerks who insanely stack pumpkin place mats on top of turkey ones. Who or what will keep them in business?
      But I won’t lie, even Nancy seemed a bit overboard this fall, until it all spilled out.
“I think I know why I’m doing all this,” she offered. “I realized that with two of our kids gonna be gone for Christmas this year, I’ve sorta been nesting. But they’ll all be here for Thanksgiving. I want this fall to be perfect. Don’t you?”
      Oh Lord, anybody know where I can buy some really nice mums?
Dear God – For some, things are desperate, or tough and getting tougher. Please deliver strength and hope. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Turns out, more victims than we thought
By George Valadie
September 16, 2011
     How much of it did you choose to watch? Or read? How much did you avoid? And how much of it did you re-live? Ten years after 9/11, we sure were given every chance, weren’t we?
     Like most schools across the country, ours took time last Friday to remember. But only some schools took the time to pray. I’m glad we got to be one of those.
     Our freshmen were but four years old then, our seniors weren’t but eight. In some odd sense, we adults wanted them to remember what they couldn’t. So I guess we were teaching as well aspreaching.
     I told our students that because of the onslaught of film clips and editorials, documentaries and memorials they would see and hear in the 48 hours to follow, by the time their weekend passed, they’d probably wish they had never heard of 9/11.
     But they should also realize that’s the exact same sentiment those people feel every single day.
     Those who survived it. Or those who lost someone. Or those who were injured. Or went to war afterward. Or waited for a loved one to come home. Or are still waiting.      Or on and on and on.
     None of us who remember really wants to remember. Most would prefer it be nothing more than some random day in some random September, with no particular significance, like most of the rest of our days we can’t recall. I know I would.
     Personally, our family didn’t lose a single member. We had no one on those flights.      No one in the buildings. No one in the city. And all of ours have come back from war.
     I do have a memory of what I was doing that day and decisions I had to make. But I can’t honestly say that any of it caused me real pain back then. But that was back then.
     We sure have been affected since. Because it turns out there’s one member of the Valadie family tree who did not escape. We just didn’t know it for a long time.
She wasn’t even there. Doesn’t know a soul who was. There’s no logical explanation.      Nothing makes sense. And not much has made it better. But the life she leads has been a far different one because of that day.
     The best description of what she battles is a “not-for-any-good-reason anxiety.”      When it rears its head, medicines can push it to the back of her mind. But not always.      And not permanently.
     For whatever reason, her experience of that day, of an event some 1500 miles away, involving no one she knew in a place she’d never been, as a result of that, she lives with the nonsensical fear that no matter what little twinge she feels or pain she suffers, it’s going to cause her to die.
     Nonsensical to everyone but her. Sometimes even to her. But for her anxiety, there’s no other conclusion. Thankfully, 98 percent of her life is as normal as yours or mine. Happy, blessed, full of life and love. She’s got future plans and dreams yet to come.
     But there are those days. Her doctor, her family and most importantly her own brain all try to convince her that sniffles are caused by a cold, or it’s a virus that spikes a fever. But there are times when none of that can out-shout her anxiety.
     I don’t know what it’s like to feel that way. But I know it’s physically sickening, causes tears and nauseousness and an inability to see a light at the end of her self-created tunnel.
     What’s worse, when it moves in, it stays for a while, and lives in her consciousness 24-7. Take your worries to the one-hundredth power and you’re getting close.
     For no reason.
     I noticed last weekend there was no million dollar memorial for people like her, no presidents will pay her tribute and her name won’t be recited anywhere. And that’s exactly as it should be. Because she’s not worthy, definitely no hero, she saved not one soul.
     The death tally related to that day is now approaching 10,000 people. Seventy-plus countries have lost citizens. Some 400 first responders died doing just that. And 3,000 children lost parents that one day … imagine how many more since then!
     There’s no way to identify with the sort of pain caused by loss and grief. And no one in our family would dare elevate these battles with “anxiety” into the same discussion.      But she’s not alone.
     They might have been unharmed. But they weren’t untouched. Turns out there could be more victims than we thought.
Dear God – Somehow, someway, there’s got to be some hidden blessings there. We could use some help though because it’s still hard to see just what they are. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Weekend un-wind covers many topics
By George Valadie
September 2, 2011
     It was late, about 11 p.m., when I finally settled back in my favorite chair. At the end of a week capped off with one of our Friday night football games, I won’t lie, it felt good.
     Don’t misunderstand. I’ll be the first to admit there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, who work a lot harder than I do. And some never even get a chance to sit in a chair.
     But still, it was nice to pet my dogs and finally read the morning paper. Too wound up for either of us to crash just yet, Nancy and I began our normal weekend un-wind.
     “Did everything go alright at the game, honey?” she asked.      “How’d the tailgating go? Did any of the players get hurt? Gee, we had a great crowd, didn’t we? Did our kids behave?”
     She normally sits in the stands; I roam around. We catch up when it’s over.
     She told me a nice story about one of our school moms who had related how much she appreciated our vigilance at these games as some of us try to keep our 8-10 eyes on 500 kids in an effort to keep them safe – sometimes from themselves.
     Nancy accepted the compliment on my behalf but laughed to herself. “Yeah,” she thought, “he can spy a goofy kid at 500 yards, but he didn’t notice the new scarf I was wearing today!”
     Ouch! But, guilty as charged.
     Then she told me about another mom who had commented, “I think that’s really sweet how – even though he’s down on the field – he still takes the time to come find you and wave.”
     Nancy couldn’t help but laugh, “Oh, he wasn’t waving at me. He was looking for his grandson, Brady. I just try to sit close to the little guy so he might notice me too.”
     Guilty as charged once again.
I could sense a developing theme. Ten minutes later my mind had moved on to all the      Saturday chores I was planning to avoid. While she, on the other hand, had been wandering down the path of “yeah, and another thing .…”
     “You know what else you don’t notice?” she added. “I got some new eye make-up and you didn’t say a word.
     “And how is it that you can get so bothered at school when people don’t post signs up on the walls neatly but you can’t notice our shrubs at home when they look like a rain forest.
     “And how many times have I gotten a haircut without a single word?”
     Ah hah! I caught her on this one because she never picks up on mine either. Then as usual, we laughed about our mutual blindnesses (though I have a few more.)      Thankfully, for us, these aren’t the things in our lives that really matter. But others do. And some can hurt.
     How is it that we occasionally quit noticing the things – and the people – that mean so much to us.
     There are pieces of their lives that should grab our attention as if written in the headlines. Life events that should stand out like Times Square neon. People whose whispers should scream at us louder than a rock concert.
     And yet, these somehow can slip past, often observed but sadly unnoticed.
     And if it’s true we can get less attuned to the people we see every day, how much more likely is it that we might not notice someone like … well, someone like God. His voice, his message, his presence. He’s seldom bold, rarely loud and never does he speak in a voice we would know. Yet, omni-present and ever-sharing.
     Reading the signs is on us. But sometimes we don’t. There will come that final day however when undetected haircuts won’t be the topic.
     “Seriously, George, with all that media stuff y’all had down there, how did you not notice the horrors in Somalia?
     “Did you ever notice that your Mom was hoping to be visited a little more often? Or that your sisters might have enjoyed an occasional call?
     “What about the kids in your halls who just wanted to talk — though they didn’t care with whom? You walked right past them.
     “Did you go blind down there?”
     That’s the fear. At least it’s mine. That just-outside-the-pearly-gates conversation.      Being reminded by the Great Reminder that others walk on this planet too.
     True, I know what happens. The day-to-day wins, at least most of the time. It robs our minutes and our moments. So we find ourselves struggling just to stay ahead, to keep afloat, to reach tomorrow.
     We just can’t get lost in all of that. Because when the time comes, I really want him to notice me.
     Dear God – Seven billion folks down here and surely you know we can’t help all of them. But I’m guessing your sights aren’t that high, are they? Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Cemetery stroll took me back in time
By George Valadie
August 5, 2011
    It’s been 18 years since we moved from our hometown.
We don’t get there nearly as much as we used to – or need to. And it seems even when we do find the time to get away from the chaos of our lives, our trips get shorter, visits more cherished.
    But there I was — back home and walking among the names that were a part of my youth.
    Nolan and White. Frassrand and Hines. Herbst and Bundschu and Crowe.
    We had travelled this weekend for a much anticipated gathering. My old classmates and I would be gathering to reconnect andreminisce at our 40th high school reunion.
    With a little word-of-mouth and a lot of Facebook, I had learned quite a few of our 110 were making plans to get there. They weren’t actually coming from “parts unknown” but they were sure unknown to me since I hadn’t seen some since we graduated.
    But I was taking this particular walk by myself.
    In the afternoon hours prior to our big blowout, I had planned to drop by my mom’s for lunch. Along the way however, my car took an unscheduled detour when I was drawn to turn into Mt. Olivet, the lone Catholic cemetery in our city.
    It’s the sort of place where if your car zips by too quickly, you won’t even know it’s there. There is no visible signage, no traffic light, and surprisingly, it’s not all that noticeable from the main road. But if you step back a little, it’s then you can take in a view of the hillside on which so many of those markers keep watch over the living.
    Unless you’ve been there before, you’d bet all your money the one-lane winding drive is a road to nowhere. But it always takes me and my memory back in time.
    Jackson and Terrell. Munson and Weidner. Cotter and Eagar and Fillauer. And oh yeah, there is a Valadie or two. There are so many more of course. I just didn’t wander over their way.
    Though we now reside in Memphis, Nancy has long said it’s where she wants to be buried. “It’s like the theme song from that old TV show ‘Cheers’” she said, “I want to go where everyone knows your name. I just have to be with people I know.”
    What struck me on this stroll was that these are the same names of many of the people with whom I would be celebrating in a few hours. Some were their parents and grandparents, others were nephews, cousins or some other branch of their family tree.
    I even walked past a couple of our classmates lying there who weren’t going to get to join us.
    I know, awfully somber thoughts for a reunion, but on the other hand, reunions are for the living. And we had ourselves a blast.
    There were yearbooks we took turns poring through. We gazed at old photos, remembered days we looked better (or worse) and recalled our four years with several scrapbooks of the memories we had long ago forgotten.
    But none of that was nearly as enjoyable as spending time with the people. Those whose families I had just visited and those who have never been there. That didn’t matter because it was all of us who were now a family, one whose roots were planted exactly 40 years ago.
    Like a lot of family reunions, we hugged and laughed and recounted the tales of our youth. We got up to speed on the present and told a few lies about the past.
    There were kids and jobs and even a few new retirements to catch up on. At previous reunions, we had done what young adults do, bragged about jobs or kids or both. But with 40 years gone by, there was a lot more talk about grandkids.
    For sure, reunions have every possibility to be awkward but I never felt that way – not once. Good or bad, the unintended effect of our school’s “academic sections” concept was we shared a majority of our days with the same group of faces.
    Thus those faces had been my best friends, the folks with whom I had felt most comfortable. But one of the beauties of time is how it can melt away not only old classroom walls but any other barriers they may have created. Families have barriers too.
    With a few hours to reflect on my own good fortune, I couldn’t help but think of the many humans who travel this planet - and then leave it - without a single friend. No one to hug or drop you a note and no one to grieve you when you go.
    We had shared quite the evening perhaps topped off with what may have been a blessing – a reminder to appreciate God’s gift of friendship. Regardless of where our own kids will lay us down (and that’s a scary thought), the friends we have known are yet another reason to look forward to that one final reunion — but not just yet.
    First, I’m looking forward to our 50th.
    Dear God – We go through life looking for best friends. Help us instead to be one. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Regarding graduation, ’7 is new 4’
By George Valadie
July 8, 2011
     Be the first in your neighborhood to sell them. Print buttons or banners, shirts or stickers. But jump in early because I just know it will be the phrase that pays – “7 is the new 4.”
     At least that’s what Sarah’s been telling us.
     In just a few weeks the Valadies will gather to celebrate; since it’s then that she’ll finally get to “walk” – as they say. She’ll climb the steps on the students’ side of the stage but descend across the way with tassel turned and degree in hand.
     If it weren’t for the scene I’d create, the face I’d make red or the police I’d attract, she would find me there at the bottom to swoop her up in my arms and tell her just how proud I am. OK, if it were just about the embarrassment, you know I’d be right there.
     It’s just taken her a while. Thus, “7 is the new 4.”
     Though we have politely called it the circuitous route, with her we have been anything but polite, a lot.
     I watched all three of our girls grow up thinking they’d ease down the same path their mother and I had. Do your homework. Graduate high school. Go to college. Earn a degree in four years. Get a job. Be an adult.
     I don’t know a thing about the Yiddish, but I now know this proverb well – “Man plans, God laughs.”
     After high school, Sarah dutifully packed up for her first year away just as we thought she should and as her sisters had done. Looking back, I thought she was ready, but we never asked.
     Katy, her oldest sister, had been a bit tentative to leave us but her first roommate was a high school bud she knew really well. Meg was no worry as the girl had been independent since the sixth grade. But we were dropping Sarah some 10 hours from home with neither … and she needed both.
     No one wants to hear the gory – and quite lengthy - details but let’s just say it didn’t work out all that well there. Or the next place. Or the next.
Back at home, as a high school educator of some 25+ years, I had long held one staunch and singular opinion – kids should go to college ASAP. If not, I was fearful they likely never would.
     Yes, I know of those who choose to spend a year “finding themselves,” be it working, travelling, maturing or just goofing off yet still return to scholarly success. I just believe them to be the exception.
     But that just wasn’t me, it wasn’t us and it darn sure wasn’t what I thought our school community expected from the children of the principal of their school. Thinking back though, I’m not at all sure it was what I should have expected of me as a dad.
     So off she went, with us pushing and persuading, cajoling and coercing. This journey has at times been frustrating and war-like. But there has been much maturity since then – by her too.
     Sarah created a good many of the hurdles she’s had to climb. She could very well be smarter than her sisters but so much more reserved. After all, she’s been editing their papers since she was in seventh grade.
     It wasn’t the books that intimidated her, it was facing all those first days of “why-don’t-we-begin-by-sharing-something-about-ourselves” that scared her away. Literally.
     Unknowingly, we had sent her off with that deadly mixture of less-than-proficient driving skills paired with some old-fashioned laziness. Rather than simply walking to class, one campus required parallel parking to get closer. And on occasion, when she couldn’t squeeze it in, she drove around looking for a space that suited her, while, it turns out, they went on with class anyway.
     The more she confessed, the more we battled.
     We can now laugh about the number of alma mater songs she’ll know. Equal to the list of giggling advisors who review her ever-lengthening transcript.
     I ask our prospective teachers, “Tell me, does it matter how long it takes a student to learn what you’re teaching? Or does the student who ‘gets it’ quickly deserve a higher grade than the others who had to work a little?” It usually leads to an interesting chat.
     So I ask you, “Do you know your doctor, kid’s teacher or your banker – do you know how long it took them to learn what they now know? Do you care?” Maybe 7 was their new 4.
     What parent hasn’t experienced this? Our kids causing a lot of their own pain. And somehow including us. Wasting our money. Increasing our stress. Adding to our prayer list.
     Sarah’s not special - so many young adults do what she’s doing – paying for their own educations, holding full-time jobs, renting their apartments and most importantly - getting it together.
     As parents, I know we’re not special. And I don’t think we’re all that different either.      We began thinking they’d all be the same. That they’d dream our dreams. Follow our paths. Seek our goals. And do it all when and where we wanted.
     It wasn’t so for Sarah. Instead, her collegiate travels were often awesome and occasionally ugly. But along the way, she taught me to be a better parent.
     It just took me seven years.
     Dear God – Will it matter to you that it took me longer than some? Amen.

(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

How do we make sense of disasters?
By George Valadie
June 10, 2011
      The other day, one of our parents asked me, “Are you looking forward to school getting out for the summer?”
Without even a micro-second of pause, the answer came rolling off my tongue with the excitement that is born of anticipation. Much like the goose bumps we used to feel on those “night-befores” when we knew tomorrow would bring our long-awaited family vacation.
“Am I excited?” I repeated, “The English language doesn’t even have that many words to ….” And we both just laughed. Needless to say, I was way beyond even the bounds of exaggeration.
But there really are times when the spoken word can do no justice to the moment. The age-old adage will remain forever true, “A picture’s worth a thousand words.”
Though not sure why, I’ve spent the last few days googling photos and news clips of the aftermath of Joplin, Mo., and Tuscaloosa., Ala. As well as the tinier places like Smithville, Miss., to whom our students sent some 50 fancy dresses as they struggled to pull together what surely will be their most memorable prom.
Not to mention I can just drive downtown to get my own personal view of the recent watery disaster right here in Memphis. My eyes can take it in, but I’m not sure my brain has. I know I can’t describe it. And I sure can’t feel it. I don’t know how.
Others have attempted the words with their weeks of media coverage and I’m glad they try. Such news can be a blessing for areas of need since these news accounts now activate a network of response assistance with ever increasing speed.
After all, how much of America do you think even knew of the 1900 Galveston hurricane? Much less rallied to aid them? Ironically, Nancy and I had been in New Orleans attending a conference the day those first tornados broke loose in the South.
Thinking back, it occurred in those days right after Easter, when we were celebrating the most famous coming-back-from-the-dead that’s ever happened. Cities and towns have to do that now.
We don’t travel much, haven’t been a lot of places or seen a lot of things. However, we made sure we carved out time to tour the French Quarter and eat more than our share of beignets. But we knew before we headed home, we couldn’t leave without visiting the Lower Ninth Ward, where Katrina had been at its worst.
I have no markers of comparison since I’d never been there before. But seeing so many still abandoned homes with the spray paint-messages on their porches and the escape holes cut into their roofs is incredibly eerie, even to the wide-eyed visitor. There still aren’t enough words for that … and we’ve had six years to think of them.
This recent tornado outburst also skipped its way to and through Chattanooga, my home town. We called all our relatives to check, in praying for the happy news we heard.
Mom said while at work that day, she was shocked to hear on the radio that one had been spotted touching down on the 15-house street on which she’s lived since 1970. She got home to see the few trees that were down and the roofs on which they’d landed, but it had skipped right over the top of hers.
This was no Joplin by any stretch unless your house is the one that’s gone, or your life.
By the way, where does an entire city of people go when all their homes are gone? And what if you do have insurance? How long will it be before they find your neighborhood, much less rebuild your one little house?
And what if the place you work is now the place you worked? How will you eat? Or feed your family? Or find them a place to sleep? Not to mention cleaning clothes and getting to take an occasional hot shower.
It can’t help but be nerve-wracking as you wonder how long this place that isn’t normally a shelter will be willing to act like one? Throw in any number of funerals you’ll want to attend, and … well, like I said, I can’t feel any of that. I don’t know how.
And what of the grief! That’s the hardest, deepest, most lasting remnant of all. Not just of those who lost family or a lifetime of everything and everyone that makes sense to them. But there’s also that grief that swims in and out of the consciousness of those who lost no one … but feel guilty for simply surviving.
Even the best photograph will never convey that.
I won’t lie; I feel as if I’ve been infected with a bit of that rubber-necking sickness that grabs hold when we’re driving down the highway past a gruesome accident, drawn to peer in at its horribleness. Not really stopping or helping, just gawking – in the ninth ward, downtown, and at all these pictures. Imagining what those moments were like and wondering what our family would do. And giving thanks didn’t have to.
If it feels like there’s no single strand of thought weaving through this column, I think it’s because I just can’t make that much sense of it.
How do they?
Dear God – Please help them understand the un-understandable. We’re kinda wondering ourselves. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Still pushing: Through school, out of nest, into world
By George Valadie
May 20, 2011
      They seem to pass much too quickly these days. But they’re already gone again … another year and another class. Another graduation and another celebration.
     Afterward, amid the joyful chaos, I ran into the parents of a former graduate from some 10 years ago who had travelled cross country to honor their niece who was now taking her turn crossing the stage of success.
     The dad asked me, “Can you believe all these years have gone by so quickly?” I nodded in agreement, “You’re so right, but I won’t lie, there have been a few days along the way that have dragged a bit.”
     And isn’t that true for moms and dads, too. Our commencement brought back memories of having met some of these same students when they were incoming transfers, interviewing in hopes of admission.
     I always ask each applicant the same question. It sounds like this: At every graduation, we finish with a procession out of the church. The teachers exit first, followed by the students.
     Our teachers will then see some student pass by and they’ll sigh, “Boy, we’re sure gonna miss that kid!”
     But then another will follow and you’ll hear someone mutter, “Oh, thank God, they’re gone!”
     But tell me, before we accept you here at our school, which will they say about you?
     Friday night we graduated 225 students who amassed almost $11 million in scholarship offers. You can’t count all the volunteer hours they’ve given. Some have been accepted into the finest colleges in the country. They led a canned-food drive that collected over 42,000 pounds of sustenance for the hungry. Overall, they’re just a great group of kids.
     Still, while I’ll never say I’m “happy” to see any of them go, as with every class, there are always a few kids who amaze me they have made it. And for one or two, God has no greater miracle to his credit.
     There were no scholarships for these, no colleges came calling. If you’re of the opinion that all people “have a thing,” well, school just wasn’t theirs.
     There’s always a reason they find it so darn tough to get this far. When it comes to academics, some just don’t, others just can’t. Some had to climb over impediments made of self-inflicted stupidity. Others had to battle their own cross-wired brain and sadly – and wrongly – believed themselves to be stupid.
     But I’m more amazed about the few who fought every rule we had. Dress code or cell phones – they loved walking the tightrope over the exit.
     There were times they strode down the halls smelling of attitude and arrogance – the smirky, snippy, I-wish-paddles-were-still-in-fashion kind.
     We have all sorts of folks who believe we should toss such ding-dongs. Why put up with such unnecessary nonsense? I get that. And we have on occasion allowed some to have a second chance … somewhere else.
     But I also think the mission of a Catholic school is to embrace the needy as well.      And Lord knows these are the ones who need us. In an odd way for sure, but they certainly do need us.
     I’ve long told people if you give us, if you give any Catholic school, four years with a kid, we’ll win. We’ll help them get it together. We’ll help them get ready to go where they might not have even known they wanted to go.
     Not all of them of course … no one wins every game. Neither do we, but I like our record.
     I’ve talked to their parents. They worked a lot harder than we did. And when I get to shake their hands after the ceremony, you can see more than just joy … there’s also that hard-to-hide hint of relief that leaks out from the smile, the voice, the tears.
     Nancy says the first real instruction a mom gets with her child is when the doctor says, “Push! Push!”
     And 18 years later, here they are, still “pushing” that same child – through the school, out of the nest, and into the world. Neither occasion comes all that easy.
     There’s a beauty to working in schools. No student has ever been exactly like another. Sorta like snowflakes – without the peacefulness. Sorta like the kids in a family.
     Schools like ours spend public relations dollars advertising the accomplishments of our best and brightest. If it’s brag-able, believe me, we will indeed brag.
     But in reality, what we do with those young people might not be our finest work.
     We celebrated great accomplishment Friday night.
     And just as much, we celebrated great hope. They’re not all the same. But they can all make it through. It’s amazing the miracles God can accomplish … especially if we push.
Dear God – Please be with them all – they can be a mess and they sure can make one. Please guard them from themselves. Amen
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Sometimes we survive in spite of ourselves
By George Valadie
May 6, 2011
      We debated it for three days before getting our answer. I was wrong, she was right. It was her roast beef after all.
     Like many Catholic schools, we dismissed at noon on Holy Thursday when I headed off to a luncheon and Nancy headed home, both looking forward to a most enjoyable Easter weekend.
     Meg would be coming to join our other two girls for a Nancy-planned weekend of hanging out, dyeing eggs, celebrating Easter Mass together and little Brady’s first Easter – all topped off with three big family dinners.
     But before it all commenced, she hurried home for some last minute tidying up. Clean sheets in place, dog hair vacuumed, holiday salt and pepper shakers set out, and oh yeah … a cleaned out refrigerator. And that’s where it all went bad.
     She pitched chunks of old roast beef down the food disposal, “in-sink-erated” it and swooshed it on to the final resting home for wherever old and graying meat goes to die.
     I know, I know, I told her the same thing. You just don’t put that sort of stuff in a disposal. It’s just that she didn’t seem to appreciate my advice, at least not at that point. As a result, we may have briefly forgotten about the holiness of Holy Thursday.
     People who know me know I really shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near tools, which is why I own but three, if you count a toilet plunger and an old rusty steak knife.
     But I went at it. I mean I went to it – the hardware store – four different times coming home with three varieties of drain cleaner before giving in to buy a salesman suggested “auger” which I discovered was nothing more than a very long and sophisticated clothes hangar with a much cooler hook on the end.
     Success was critical since we were looking at three days of cooking with no sink, no dish washer and not much patience left.
     By now, the whole family had gathered to watch. And when all attempts at the sink had proven unsuccessful, I announced I’d be heading down below into the dark shadows where the plumbing pipes live.
     That alone brought howling laughter that would make you think they had a front row seat at Jeff Foxworthy. They suggested we sell tickets.
     Job #1 became clearing out the mess of stuff in our cabinet that blocked all access to the pipes. It was a gold mine of money we should have never spent: two cans of Lysol, mostly full, exactly alike. I’m not sure why we have three fly swatters, they’re not disposable, are they?
     We own two microfiber chenille dusters, with little turquoise squiggly things sticking out everywhere that resemble Little Orphan Annie’s hair. Oddly, not one had a spec of dust on it.
     I found seven bud vases, all of which had accumulated a wealth of dust that ironically the chenille dusters didn’t seem to have attracted. There were the decayed remains of three long-deceased Brillo pads, an iron skillet, three sorts of dog shampoo and a lacrosse ball, though none of us have ever played.
     Eventually, I cleared a path to the pipes, took that cap right off like I knew what I was doing and of course was immediately drowned with a sink and dishwasher full of yucky water.
     A mop, some rags and a roll of paper towels later, I forced a good bit of that 30’ auger deep into the wall. If the problem was beyond that we would either need a pro or a new house. I failed.
     But Easter came anyway. As did our family feasts. As always, it was wonderfully tasty — and messy.
     Our solution? What else would you expect of a family with three tools. It’s amazing how much you can accomplish with a front yard hose and a super-blaster nozzle attachment. Add a little dishwashing soap. Rinse. Repeat. It’s all good. (Ask the neighbors, I wouldn’t lie.)
     We had called our plumber early Friday morning but they were closed for the weekend and I couldn’t blame them. They probably figured surely no one would be silly enough to put roast beef down their disposal on Easter weekend.
     On Monday he came to save us from any other damage we might do to ourselves. I’d been hoping that a small rag was causing such blockage because after all, I had eaten that same roast. But his monster sucker-outer device confirmed that meat was the culprit.
     I won’t insult anyone by even trying to draw some far-out analogy to the miracle of Easter. Except to say, who among us doesn’t survive this life in spite of ourselves?
     Sometimes our mistakes are silly. But sometimes they’re far worse. It’s for all those he came to this earth. It’s for those he died. And it’s for those he is called our Savior.
     As for the silly things like pipes and tools and no common sense, I’m convinced he leaves us to try life on our own. But I won’t lie; at times, my house could use a little divine protection. From us.
Dear God – Thank you from all of us who get to enjoy family, roast beef and a home with sinks that might clog. So many don’t have any of that. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Right? Wrong? We parents do best we can!
By George Valadie
April 15, 2011
     Pop wasn’t exactly bald in his later years, but he was headed in that direction for sure — mostly on the top, where he rubbed, where we made him rub.
     I met Pop, Nancy’s father and my eventual father-in-law, when he was but 54. He passed away at 87. He lost a lot of hair in between.
     He shared a lifetime with Mammaw, his wife and Nancy’s mom, until he died, the two of them having celebrated 60+ years of marriage. She left us at 90.
     Her hair seemed to have withstood our family much better than his. In fact not one of hers was ever muffed so she must have worried about us in a different manner, because we sure enough gave them plenty to worry about.
     We were remembering them this weekend when our three girls all gathered at home for a rare weekend when they were here without the company of their spouses and significant others who were elsewhere. Just “The Original Five” as one of them said.
     We were discussing their now adult lives; the oldest is 32 while the youngest is 24. We were recalling and laughing about the highs and lows they’ve already encountered as well as the smaller dips, swerves, twists and turns that make up a life.
     Needless to say, their mother and I couldn’t help but regale them with similar tales of our own youth. The hard times that fell around us as well as those we insanely grabbed for and then pulled down upon our own heads.
     But the discussion eventually worked its way to how often the parents (us) of adult children (them) involve ourselves in their lives. Wanted or not.
     Call it what you will – moms and dads advising, sharing and loving or is it weighing in, butting in and nosing in. Regardless, some of us choose to do it, some don’t.
     And some just can’t control the urge.
     Mammaw and Pop were the best I’ve ever seen at allowing their adult children to live their own lives – no matter how stupid we were or how much hair we caused them to lose.
     And we did do some pretty stupid things.
     For six months, we drove a car that wouldn’t go in reverse. Followed by another that had no emergency brake – at least not after the pull handle had come off in Nancy’s hand.
     Once we drove out of town to see a concert returning home with but 25 cents in our pockets for possible emergencies.
     We’ve been known to frantically load our car trunk with all the ironing each time the realtor called to show our house, but only after we had crammed the dirty dishes into the oven.
     I once thought it seemed sensible to stay at work rather than bring Nancy and our second infant home from the hospital.
     We even slept for a year in a leaky bedroom where it rained every bit as much on the inside as on the outside.
     And each of those displays of maturity happened after we had children. I don’t know if they worried more about us or their grandkids who were growing up with us.
     But in spite of all our craziness or what they truly thought about it, I don’t recall them ever saying a word about the lousy or insane decisions they likely thought we were making. Pop just rubbed his head.
     We had to admit to our daughters we haven’t been nearly that restrained, eliciting three quick nods of agreement.
     Nancy of course wants them to benefit from our wisdom, to save them from the pain, to learn from our many mistakes. But there are occasions when they just don’t seem anxious to take advantage.
     It’s almost as if they want to live their own lives!
     And that’s when Nancy has been known to recoil with what has become her standard comeback “OK, that’s fine. I wish you all the luck in the world.” Imagine that encouragement with just a tint of sarcastic inflection and you’ll get the picture.
     Parenting, no matter their age — or ours — is difficult if not torturous.
     You might have begun this mom and dad odyssey not even sure if you could adequately love some grapefruit sized fetus you’d never met, until you met them. An hour later, if not a minute, you knew you’d kill or die to protect them.
     And many years later, you realize no matter how old they’ve grown, you’d still do the same. While sometimes the person you want to kill is them.
     I don’t think Nancy or I would ever fall into the category of the ever-hovering “helicopter parents” we hear so much about these days. But we’ve surely been known to fly by on occasion.
     Right, wrong – who knows — we parents just do the best we can. And whether or not our kids seem to hear us, our hope can be their moms and dads have grown much wiser than we were back then.
     Pop can rest better now.
     Dear God – Thank you for all those who care enough to send their very best, whatever they might think that is. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘A grieving man has made us better’
By George Valadie
April 1, 2011
     When you work with teenagers, everyday is an adventure. They’re always a hoot – though I’ve used other, more descriptive phrases on occasion.
     It’s often like finding yourself on one of those death-defying, vomit-inducing, “Armageddon Asteroid” roller-coaster rides where you find yourself laughing and screaming at the same time at the same student.
     Then — when you get off — you’re not quite sure if you’ll come back. To the job, I mean – not the ride.
     But one of my favorite parts is getting to interview students who think they might wish to transfer in from another high school. I always invite the parents to join their child; but often to their surprise, I never speak to them, I don’t even look at them. It’s just me and the kid. You can learn a lot that way.
     About the student. And about the parents. As that’s when they find themselves feeling that same sort of loop-the-loop, stomach flip-flopping feeling, all while sitting in a chair that never moves.
     I always wrap up by asking each student, “I’m looking for students who – long after they’ve graduated – I can look back and say, ‘Our school is better because you were here.’ Tell me, is that you? Because if it’s not, I should look elsewhere, right?”
     I’ve seen more than a few parents on the verge of their own roller-coaster regurgitation when – right before their eyes — their kids have spit out, “No sir, I don’t think I can do that.”
     To save them from themselves, I always try to help those kids understand that we’re not looking for improvement of the mountain-moving variety. Little things can work just as well.
     For sure, teenagers are a hoot.
     But I’ve been thinking about how each of us has a similar task on this planet. I think we’re supposed to leave it just a little bit better than we found it. Thankfully, at least thus far, when we haven’t delivered as we should, our Creator hasn’t said,      “Well, since you’re not getting it done, I should look elsewhere, right?”
     True, some of us actually have moved mountains. I salute them. But I don’t think it’s a requirement of the job of being a human. We’re not the earth’s owners, just its caretakers for the little bit of time we’ve been given to walk on it.
     Recently, I’ve found another such person who has made our school better though I don’t think he has any idea. In fact, he’d be dumbfounded if I told him he had.
     His name is James and he works with the all-female kitchen staff with whom our school sub-contracts for our lunch services. Though his tasks are many, he’d best be described as the “fry chef.”
     He prepares and serves what our kids eat the most – chicken tenders, burgers and fries, lots and lots of fries.
     I have no idea how old he is, but the many haggard lines on his face lead me to believe he is older than I. Combined with his deliberate gait and overall appearance, I imagine his has not been an easy life. I do have a sense of how much he earns, and it isn’t much.
     But the man is always smiling to me, to our faculty and to all our kids. And he’s kind and helpful to every single one of us.
     He never seems to have a bad day – though I know that just can’t be true. In fact, he’s had at least one recently because his wife of many years died the other day. As a result, he missed a day of work, but just one, and then he was back at it.
     As with most sadness that impacts our building, I let the teachers and staff know so they would keep her and him in their prayers. Some then shared it with their classes and many of the kids expressed their own condolences. At least he said they had.
     But the dam broke wide when he approached a friendly-faced teacher and asked for a favor. He had brought a homemade wooden sign to school in hopes someone might be able to help.
     Turns out, not so surprisingly, he had neither the insurance nor the income to afford a tombstone for her grave. And he was hoping we could help him paint one that would honor her.
     A commonly used phrase in this computer driven world is that something has gone “viral,” meaning it has spread across the globe via the Internet with heretofore unfathomable speed.
     But there are times when a mass of high school students can be equally as efficient – if not faster. So news of James’ dilemma spread throughout our building.
     Suffice it to say, the reaction of students, staff and even parents who have never even met the man has been one of wanting to help. But it’s been much deeper than that, really.
     As self-absorbed as teens can surely sometimes be, some have poured forth their tears while others have felt a call to action like no previous cause they’ve encountered. But all have found themselves face-to-face with a glimpse of the human condition that up until now they’d likely only seen in their history books.
     A grieving man standing over nothing but a simple wooden marker.
     One guy who cooks fries and smiles a lot.
     His kindness has made us better.
     I know he inspires me to try.
     Dear God – We’ve long ago come to terms with the fact everyone doesn’t have the same. But help us remember everyone can act the same. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Grandson faces lifetime of choices
By George Valadie
March 4, 2011
      I’ll be the first to admit it, grandkids are cool, little ones anyway.       I never imagined I’d love him as much as I do. Brady’s a treat so far.
      But I have a confession to make, before he actually arrived on the scene, Katy’s pregnancy just didn’t feel any more exciting to me than if it had been happening to a dear friend, certainly not my daughter.
      I tried to fake it, I did. But Nancy called me on it, she could tell. I’d have explained it if I could, but I couldn’t. So she told me to fake it better.
      But I won’t need to with the next one.
      Whatever I was feeling – or not feeling – wasn’t at all true of his two grandmas.       They were and are appropriately insane.
      With this new little family of three living but five minutes away, we’re fortunate enough to get to see them quite often. And with Katy being a Facebook savvy mom, I get to see his every cute moment – and some that aren’t really. But I just blather away – ever so excitedly.
      But I do love it when he comes to visit. At but nine months, he’s young enough to think that Grumpaw’s goofy faces and hand gestures are still funny. And young enough for me to think his occasional tantrums are still cute.
      I tickle him and he laughs, he cries and I laugh. We have the perfect relationship.
      I’m guessing when he gets older I’ll need to extensively enlarge my repertoire of grandfatherly tricks. Food always worked with our girls so I’ll likely buy his love, and       I’m OK with that.
      But nothing gets to me more than when he collapses in my lap for a nap.
      Recently, that’s exactly where he was, knocked out cold, dreaming about who knows what, when I fell into my own reverie. Wondering what all lies ahead for little Brady. And imagining all the choices he will face.
      Since I do what I do, it was the teenage life on which I was focusing. Because it was just a week ago when a young man found himself in my office for what had begun as nothing more than a trivial thing, really.
      He had messed up – as most all do at some time – and was called on it. But then he lost his mind.
      In an effort to escape a consequence that was more inconvenient than anything, for whatever reason, he decided his best course was to lie. Not a trait of every teenager, but I’ll have to admit I can recall one or two of my own.
      But, in addition to the stupidity of this un-truth, he demonstrated an equally unwise choice of when and where to tell it. As is usually the case, the first requires a second which begets a third. I think we were up to four, when he finally found himself in front of the principal.
      But it’s always the case that each one had been nothing more than a choice.
      On the same day, a different student dropped by requesting some of my time. He was asking me to consider if I might organize a school-wide fund-raiser to benefit his Protestant church’s youth group. In addition to trying to educate themselves about worldwide hunger, these teens are also assisting a Third World country in the digging of a much needed water well.
      And that only happens with money. He was determined and prepared, coming with facts and figures and a DVD he was hoping I’d take the time to watch.
      Confident and undaunted, he had no hesitancy whatsoever in asking for our Catholic school help for his non-Catholic church. Nor should he have.
      Funny maybe, but both had looked me in the eye and both had spoken with the same amount of confidence. And both had made a choice before they ever came in the door.
      After a confession and lots of tears, the guilty guy of the pair said to me, “I admit I was stupid. But please, I’m not this kind of person.” At which point I asked, “At what point does a person who tells lies become a liar?”
      I suppose the same could be asked of the second though. “At what point does someone who performs a spiritual act become a spiritual person.” Because I think we all know many who have — but who aren’t.
      The first young man might indeed be right. At least I hope he’s not that sort of person. It’s not one is a sinner and one is a saint. It’s never easy and never clear cut.       But both are on a path.
      And then there lies Brady with a lifetime of choices in front of him. And here snuggled with him sits his Grumpaw. Wondering and praying about the path he will choose. Or how many different ones he’ll wander down, through and across.
      I’ll say it again. Grandkids are indeed cool. Just not perfect, unless they could stay right here in my lap.
      Dear God – Please guide and protect however long we have them here, before you get to have them there. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘We joined Facebook; I pray we use it well’
By George Valadie
February 18, 2011
      We did it. We had sworn we never would, but we did. Nancy and       I went over to the darkside. We joined Facebook.
      All my daughters joined this social networking thing long ago and ever since they’ve been hounding us to join them. It’s not like I’m philosophically opposed, but I have been leery.
      I don’t really want to be “friends” with my students. Over 60+ hours a week is plenty for me. So part of my hesitancy was caused as I tried to grapple with what it means to be a Facebook “friend” and how that differed from the ones I already had.
      Until recently, I hadn’t cared enough to understand it, so I wasn’t sure if I could control who would and wouldn’t, could and couldn’t see the thoughts I might choose to share in writing.
      Not to mention the continuous and cautionary mantra we hear and fear, “Once you put it on the Internet, it’s up there forever.” And that seems like a long time.
      Still, my fears aside, our girls sure did seem to know a lot more about our extended family than we did. Who’s dating whom? Who’s pregnant? Who’s moved up? Moved out? Moved in? And why they do all this moving?
Besides who wants to be left behind a good chunk of the rest of the world? Supposedly there are 500 million Facebook users with half of them logging on every single day. I’ve seen most of them. They seem to eat in the same places we do.
      Couples sitting across from one another in cozy and romantically lit booths, but both with a phone and an app and a life-and-death need to know what’s happening in others’ lives, maybe missing a chance to live their own.
      But all of that aside, it’s a new year and we’re in. Novices for sure, likely to embarrass ourselves, but giving it a go. So I set out to find some “friends.”
      I first asked my daughters if they’d accept my request and they dutifully obliged.       In a matter of moments, my friend count leaped to three. This seemed easy enough.
      But after that, I began to feel that same uneasy trepidation I had in high school when I had wanted to ask a girl for a date. But I couldn’t pull the trigger, deathly afraid of rejection.
      Not only that, but I was equally fearful of the imaginary network I had created in my head, every bit as efficient as today’s — even without the Internet. It was there, after rejection, where us “losers” would be talked about and laughed about by the cool kids.
      Why would this be any different? It would just be faster.
      But age has given me a tad more self-confidence, so I sent out some “friend requests,” hopeful to be accepted. Today I’m proudly up to 126 but seeking four more (should you know anyone) since the average Facebook user supposedly has 130 friends. Confident or not, I still want to be at least average.
      It’s funny, but before this, I had never felt the need to count my friends. I just liked them.
      I’ve read it’s possible one can technologically trace the various folks who have looked at your “page.” I’ll admit, that could be interesting, but I stopped short, deciding only sadness would result. I’d be unearthing a list of people who had peeked into my life but who had then consciously chosen not to contact me. How depressing would that be!
      Whenever I interview prospective high school students for admission, I ask each if they’re into the Facebook world and most of course are. I ask the same question again and again – “Have you ever learned anything of educational value in all your time spent on Facebook.” Their 100 percent reply, “No, not that I can remember.”
      Which makes me laugh each time I log on and see one of the four main Facebook options is a “news feed.” The stuff I see there is definitely new, but not generally thought of as the site we might choose to learn about Egypt’s revolt and Mubarak’s exit.
      And yet we forget. The Facebook on which we Americans share gossip and music and what we just ate for dinner is ironically the same tool that had an inspiring if not organizing role in the efforts of those Egyptian youths. Historically and forever, it will be remembered as the world’s first Social Media Revolution.
      I’ve really enjoyed my little bit of time on Facebook. I’ve been able to do what it likely was created to do, at least in part – re-established contact with many old friends. Those folks I’ve mistakenly allowed to slip out of my life. No letters, no post cards, no phone calls. We just stopped talking.
      And now we have the chance – again – to do what friends do. To do what we did when we were in high school — when we mostly talked about each others’ lives, dates and homework, parents and weekends.
      Now it’s kids and grandkids, do you remember that album and when can we get together again?
      Consider it. Users combine for 700 billion minutes per month. Do the math. That’s 300 lifetimes of logged on Facebook time — every month. True, some of it’s a pretty stupid waste of God’s gift of time.
      But with some of it — we get to reach out to family and friends, God’s greatest gifts.
Dear God – It might be the end of pens and postage stamps but it works. Please help us use it well. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Is there such a thing as a sadder sadness?’
By George Valadie
January 21, 2011
      Is there such a thing as a sadder sadness?
      Or one tragedy being worse than another?
      If you spend much time thinking about just the ones that come to mind quickly, you’ll find yourself at the bottom of a very deep and depressing well.
      Some have been brought about by the forces of nature others by the insanity of humanity.
      The World Trade Center. The earthquake in Haiti. Columbine. The Indonesian tsunami. The Titanic. The Pan-Am bombing over Lockerbie. The Civil War. Any war.
      Pearl Harbor. The onset of AIDS. The Holocaust. The Oklahoma City bombing. Or the most recent shooting in Tucson by one more unexplainable lunatic? Can one painful loss tear into the heart more than another?
      And we all know that the magnitude of grief has never been limited to newsworthy calamities.
      I don’t know that I’ve ever seen Nancy sadder than when her mother and father each took their turn sliding down the hill toward their own demise. The end was bad.       Them getting there was worse. Nothing public, nothing newsworthy. Painful and very sad all the same.
      I’m not sure these sad, sadder, saddest questions are worth thinking about, much less answering. But there was a newspaper story I read the other day that has been poking at my heart ever since. And it won’t stop.
      It was front page and all, but only 280 words. Recently, a woman, whose name was not released, was discharged from a local hospital but never left. Instead, she proceeded to the waiting room and just decided to stay.
      After willingly sharing space with her for some time, the hospital eventually contacted the police who arrived at 11 p.m. There they met up with the lady who had taken up residence since her dismissal at 6:30 a.m. that morning. Just over 16 hours.
      But really, why wouldn’t she stay? Turned out she was homeless, had nowhere to go and was facing nothing but the 15 degree weather outside.
      The hospital was relying on the police hoping they could get her to a shelter. As it turned out, they had no need.
      Before finally accompanying them, she excused herself to the restroom one last time where she then shot and killed herself.
End of story. Literally.
      I’ve been looking for follow-up articles about her but haven’t found any – and I’m not sure what could be written anyway. Maybe I’ve missed it, but I’ve looked for her obituary as well but haven’t found one of those either. Seems as if she’ll be leaving with no fanfare, family, friends, I can’t even find a name.
      Those 280 words have been haunting me like few I’ve ever read. Maybe it’s because she and I are both 57 years old. Perhaps it’s because it could have happened to any of us. But mostly I don’t get how she got to the saddest of all decisions.
      Imagine enduring what this woman did. She sat in a hospital through two entire work shifts and all I can picture is a lady overcome with an overwhelming sense of “what do I do now?” with not a single answer.
      Hour upon hour spent running through her lists. When she could come up with no friends, she turned to the places she might go.
      But there was no one and no place on either. Well, nothing but shelters. She likely could have stayed in that waiting room a week and the answer would have still been the same. Sixteen hours and nothing but shelters.
      What were her choices? The one with the hottest food or the softest cot? The one where the kids cry all night or where she’d been robbed once already? Or the only one she could get in at this late hour, if there still was one. Fifteen degree weather tends to pack in the crowds.
      I’m guessing she’s likely been to all of them.
      If you’re sitting in a room like I am with fireplace burning, dogs at my feet and the smells of dinner wafting from the kitchen – I think it’s easy to suggest a free shelter isn’t such a bad option when you’ve got no other.
      Unless you’re suggesting it to someone with absolutely no hope. Not anymore anyway. No thought of it. No memory of it. None.
      Is it possible she was insane? Or maybe running from something? She might have even been struggling to make sense of her own tragic loss.
      But no matter, she’d come to the decision that no longer being here was her best choice. And could see no hope for anything better. Imagine that.
      No really, take a minute and imagine that.
      What can be sadder than lost hope?
Dear God – What can be greater than regained hope? Maybe getting to heaven isn’t all that complicated — living our lives helping others. Please welcome her home. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘What I need is mirror to my soul’
By George Valadie
January 7, 2011
     What did you get for Christmas?
     As I look back at the various gifts my family was kind enough to give, it occurs to me most of them – at least this year – were given so I might look a little better. They were trying to help anyway.
     They appreciate it’s tough for a professional to look that way when shirts are frayed and pants have that worn-out shine. And nothing bothers them more than when they find my socks drooping around my ankles at day’s end.
     Nancy is apparently tired of a few of my ties and openly admits to hating the rest. So she kindly added a couple to my collection.
     But one of the most eye-opening gifts I received was one of those big round double-sided mirrors you find in fancy hotel bathrooms. I’ll be honest, it was I who placed this on my “What-do-you-want-for-Christmas-list?”
     It’s the kind that’s supposed to be attached to the side wall of your vanity area, with one of those extendable arms that brings you nose-to-nose with your nose. One side offers the normal mirror view (bad as it is) though the arm thing brings you much closer. And if that isn’t revealing enough, the flip-side allows you to see each crack and crevice with a magnification power of eight.
     Scientifically, that means something. In the early morning, it’s just scary.
     I got inspired to suggest such a gift for myself when I had a rare opportunity to stay in one of those fancy hotel rooms. I had shaved and showered and envisioned myself looking pretty darn good for the day ahead. Until I stretched out their mirror to take a quick look.
     Ouch! Apparently, my 57-year-old eyeballs had been failing me worse than I already knew. The revelation was clear though – my typical morning that’s been spent three feet from my mirror hadn’t been providing me with full disclosure.
     Over those same years, I’ve also come to appreciate the fact I am who I am and no mirror’s reflection, close encounter or otherwise, can ever improve that. But this new microscopic look did reveal my shaving, clipping and tweezing had been woeful at best, leaving me as facially frayed as my shirts.
     So I requested one of these for my own. Bad news and all.
I should begin by admitting the installation process required tools I lacked and for which I found myself substituting our ice cream scooper. There was a moment there when I was thinking a new hammer might have been a better gift.
     But once on the wall, I quickly questioned my own request. I was stunned to see I am as wrinkled as I am. Upon close inspection, it appears the few I’ve had for awhile have branched out much as rivers fork into streams and streams meander into creeks.      And if there’s something smaller than a creek, I’ve got some of those too.
     My brow is permanently furrowed even when I try to unfurrow it. And I also noticed a small discoloration on the side of my nose which I used to call a blotch before my dermatologist took up residence in my head.
     And lastly, as my vision has left my body, it appears it has been replaced by whiskers and hairs now appearing where it doesn’t seem like any ought to be.
     I love my new toy, but after my own consideration for a bit, my guess is your thoughts are much the same as mine.
     “This whole thing is nothing more than vanity run amuck. Shiny pants and sagging socks? Seriously? Come on, George, get over it. Shower, shave, shampoo and get on with your life.”
     You’re right. And that’s when it hit me. My life needs so much more than an up-close look at the landscape of my face — spots and bumps and whiskers gone wild.      It’s nice to look nice, but do these things really matter?
What I need is a mirror to my soul.
     I’d be so much better off knowing exactly what’s been happening down in there?      To face what’s been growing and what I’ve been ignoring? Any dark splotches? Or “how many” is probably the better question? And how many rivers of rationalization have splintered into brooks that now babble with nothing but a lot of bad habit?
     Where can you go to get that sort of Christmas gift?
     I was reminded of that time – and I don’t recall all that many — when the voice of the Heavenly Father boomed loudly and clearly for humanity to hear, “This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.”
     And don’t you know it had nothing to do with wrinkles or whiskers or socks that did not sag.
     Will he ever be proud of me?
Dear God – We’ve been known to focus our efforts on all the wrong things. New Years give us new chances. Thank you for this one. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Holiday always provide family adventure
By George Valadie
December 10, 2010
      The holidays, whew! What an adventure!
     Is your family comprised of some “We-always-have-and-we-always-will …” holiday traditionalists? Or is something new always coming your way? I’ve long been sure our family was full of the former, but I realize now life has turned us into the latter. We just weren’t paying attention.
     Our latest not-the-way-we-imagined-it holiday began just before      Thanksgiving when we found out our two married daughters weren’t going to be at our house on Turkey Day. They know their mother well, so they broke the news gingerly.
     I know, I know — there are many families who never get to have everyone around the same table anymore. I hate that for them.      Though I’ll admit, there have been a few Valadie celebrations when such an idea didn’t seem all that drastic.
     But we’ve always had at least two of the girls with us, if not all three. I always miss whoever might not be there, but Nancy — well, she was on suicide watch about this whole development.
     Two weddings bring two sets of in-laws with whom we now share. I don’t know how she did it, but Nancy jumped in to insure they’d both be travelling this Thanksgiving so everyone would be at our house for Christmas. At least this year!
     She’s a pretty good negotiator when it comes to things she has no intention of negotiating.
     We all laugh about Nancy’s inability to adjust to any change. On those nights when she surrenders to a last-minute switch from a taco hut to a burger joint, she’s so proud of herself. In her words, she proudly claims, “I’m really flowing.” It’s in these moments, rare though they may be, she boasts that she has no problem adapting to whichever of life’s curve balls come her way.
     For an overly addicted control freak, her head almost explodes when she utters it, but she tries. Until her burger has no pickles and then … well, I’ve seen her clog up the “flow” pretty darn quickly.
     So with just three of us at home, we flowed. Sarah, our youngest, never has liked turkey, hates dressing, and wouldn’t eat a berry or a bean on a bet. So we decided we would, for the first time in our lives, go out to a restaurant to enjoy our Thanksgiving meal - maybe after a movie.
     Our Thanksgiving film, which replaced my easy chair and football games, was really pretty good. Afterward, we arrived at the restaurant at 2:15 p.m. or so, exactly the moment we had guessed might be the perfect in-between time for holiday eaters.
     There weren’t 10 cars in the parking lot which confirmed our prediction, except for the part about them having just closed their doors at 2. So we had been dead-on; we were “in-between” their closing today and their opening tomorrow.
     Our Plan B spot had what seemed to be about two to three thousand cars in the lot. So we whipped up a Plan C on the fly — dinner at a diner. I don’t say that to disparage any of the three locales. We had a great meal, though I’ll admit it was new for me to have scrambled eggs as my holiday feast.
     But we laughed, told stories and stuffed ourselves just like always. Nancy had no meal to cook, I had no dishes to wash and Sarah had no food of any sort to politely refuse. Wasn’t all bad.
     As for the Christmas traditions we thought we could never live without, well …, not so much. Recalling the Noels of our past, we realized we had celebrated in several different cities, with a number of different people in quite a few different homes, some that weren’t even ours. But I can’t think of a single one of those holidays we didn’t thoroughly enjoy.
     Not to compare ourselves at all, but didn’t the first Nativity happen in just the same way?
     As childbirths go, this was not at all what these two people had imagined or would have preferred. But still, here was a family that had to be away from home at their most important moment.
     And with no M.D. or maternity ward back then, I can only imagine having a baby would go much better — or at least seem that way - when surrounded by family and friends.
     Nazareth and Bethlehem are separated by only 68 miles. But on a donkey packed down with your stuff and a pregnant wife, the distance between these soon-to-be parents and the people they knew best and needed most could only be measured in days, not miles.
     And at journey’s end, even the stable where they landed likely belonged to some strangers. I like to picture these two families sharing at least one meal together. “You just had a baby? Really? Well, come on in.”
     Perhaps that’s what the original Christmas tradition was intended to be. Eventful, but not all about the familiar. A family in the middle of a miracle they never imagined, in a place that was not theirs, with people that were not family. Sharing a gift and the first Christmas they sensed should never be kept unto themselves.
     Nancy says one thing we should have learned through the years is we should enjoy the whomevers, whatevers, and wherevers that come our way. Or maybe that actually is the lesson. Changes in life are not to be fixed, or controlled, just embraced.
Dear God -Thank you for all those people who have welcomed us in. May we always do the same. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Take time to list a few of your blessings
By George Valadie
November 26, 2010
      I can’t decide if I’m irritated at them or not. A week or so ago a few of our almost 1,000 high school students decided they’d try to organize a boycott of the lunches being served in our school cafeteria. As teenage boycotts go, I was amazed how many rebels they enlisted.
     Just like a growing number of high schools, ours is a place where the food and the forks and the employees are all managed by a third party company we hired to save us from having to fight that particular fight.
     All things considered, I think we have one of the best around.      They offer so much more variety than I ever had as a student. They provide a salad bar, a deli sandwich bar, a hot food bar, a dessert bar, a rack of candy and chips, a cooler of fruit, yogurt and fruit juices, a freezer full of ice cream, and a lot more.
     And they do it every day.
     But without question the most popular is the bar that offers burgers, chicken strips and fries. There’s no question we serve both the unhealthy and the healthy.
     A lot of our students bring their lunch from home as well. (Some of them wanted to boycott too so I’m not sure they understood it.) And I’m guessing some of our kids just pocket their parents’ money. Honestly, I could care less. I’ve just never wanted to serve as the food police.
     Apparently this whole boycott thing started because of a change a few months ago in the drink cups that were being sold. One less ounce, no drop in price. They were incensed. There were a few other bothersome factors but that’s what kicked it off.
     I can’t imagine it’s their first face-to-face encounter with inflation – nor will it be their last. And they have every right to take such action. It’s about time they learned something about economics because it happens in the marketplace every day.
     Inspired by Rosa Parks, African-Americans boycotted bus service. Grapes were boycotted to shed light on the conditions of the migrant workers. Entire countries stayed away from the 1980 Olympics in Russia to stand against their invasion of Afghanistan.
     And there have been segments of Catholic believers who took similar action when they disapproved of the movie “Angels and Demons.”
     True, each of those was aimed at righting a much more serious wrong than our kids were tackling. But numerous and recent pricing boycotts have happened as well – the most recent targeting the gasoline we all buy.
     Years ago, we students had to work really hard to pull off such baby steps along the path of citizenship. Not so anymore. A few words on Facebook, be they factual or not, a single click and you’ve got yourself some teenage non-violent protest.
     I was proud they were respectful and polite but disappointed they left out two key parts. They never arrived at a consensus as to what irritated them and thus never quite informed the company, “We’re boycotting you … guess why.” OK, so they’ve got a little more to learn.
     I couldn’t sit back quietly. I had to make the one point that bothered me most.
     Yes, they were free to boycott and yes, they could make their point. But they should never forget the blessings that they enjoy. When you have the luxury to worry about how your food tastes and what it costs – but if you never have to worry about from where it comes or if you’ll get to have any – then your life is good.
     So gripe, but don’t forget what you have. Honestly, I do it all the time myself. Not intentionally, but what does that matter.
     What better season is there to take the time to list a few of my blessings. Many I overlook daily.
     For my family. They’re nuts. All of them. Me, the ones we raised, the one who raised me, the ones I grew up with, and the one whom I married. And all the people we invited to join us. We laugh and cry and love. And I think we miss one another.
     For my job. For our jobs. Mine, my wife’s, my daughters’ and their husbands. In this day and time, I hurt for the parents who come in our school to tell us they have lost theirs. They never imagined it would happen. And now they’re trying to cobble together a life for their family from very few cobbles.
     For my house. Or should I say for the fact I get to have one. With lights and hot water, heat, air and four walls. For my warm clothes though I’m embarrassed to think how many I have. How did that happen? Why have I let it?
     For my car. I can’t envision what my life would be like if I was forced to get to and from work on a bus. Like so many others do. Like my mom did. And on a bitterly cold morning, I won’t lie, our garage inspires a prayer of thanks.
     For my insurance. Of all kinds. We can afford most of what we need. When we need it.      We’re healthy because of it. While others are wondering … sick, and just wondering.
     And yes, for my food. We have more than we need; it’s better than we deserve; and we enjoy it much more often than most of the world. Maybe our citizenship – adults and teens — can include reaching out to those in need.
     Dear God – Please bless all whose lives are such they wonder if they’re blessed at all. They need the gift of hope. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`May all departed rest in peace. Amen’
By George Valadie
November 12, 2010
      I met the groom only twice. Literally, on only two occasions. I doubt I said more than 15 words to him either time.
      And I met his parents just once. They were in a receiving line at the young couple’s engagement announcement party. “Hello, I’m George. This is my wife Nancy. I was the principal where Hannah went to high school.”
      “Oh, hello, how are you, so nice of you to come.”
      That was it.
      We were invited to their wedding months later but we couldn’t go. We wanted to, we really did, but finances kept us away. Looking back now, I regret we couldn’t find a way.
      Because a week or so ago, they cremated Noel. Leaving Hannah, eight months pregnant with their first, who processed out of the church with the kind of empty hole in her heart you could practically see. Carrying a not-so-empty urn of his ashes you wish you couldn’t.
      We’ve known Hannah for 15 years as she and our middle daughter, Meg, were classmates through high school, roommates through college and likely best friends forever. It’s one of God’s greatest gifts that people can have many best friends.
      But if best can become best-est, they cemented that during these last two years as they shared – as much as two people can share – the decline and death of Hannah’s husband. Phone calls and texts, facebooks and airplanes. A lot of time spent crying and a lot more spent just “being there.”
      When we used to live in the same city, we enjoyed dinner in Hannah’s home and no family has ever been kinder to our children. They took Meg on vacation, they helped her buy a car, they treated her as one of their own.
      These two girls had long planned to be in each other’s weddings until just a few weeks ago when Hannah couldn’t return the favor for Meg. Noel’s downhill slide was getting steeper and faster and she couldn’t leave him. No one expected her to.
      As it turned out, at the same time our Meg was walking down the aisle, Hannah was walking him into a hospice center. And he never got to leave.
      When we heard, it made for one of the saddest day-after-a-wedding’s you’ve ever seen. All of the girls in the party had known, but they had been given express orders by Hannah not to ruin Meg’s day. It’s the sort of things best-est friends do for each other.
      I’ve always liked her and the rest of Meg’s friends. Not that I didn’t like all the other kids at the school, but I suppose we just got to see more of that group. Our home was always buzzing with shared meals, teamwork homework, pre-dance pictures and such.
      Back then, Nancy and I naively – or stupidly — liked to think of their group as well-behaved, predominately common-sensical students. Mostly, we had it right.
      When they were in high school, they had a schoolmate friend who died in a weekend car wreck. I told everyone then they were not too young to experience death, but they were way too young to experience the death of one of their own.
      As they’ve gotten older, that’s not quite so true anymore — we just wish it was. Noel died at 29. The brain cancer won. Not as sudden as a crash, they had fought it for two-plus years.
      And though I don’t really know what I’m talking about, the fact he passed into and out of remission along the way would only seem to make it worse. It would for me anyway.
      Eulogies can be full of stories about the deceased. It’s then the people who didn’t know them well get that last chance to catch up on all the good stuff everyone else in the church already knew. And so it was for us. We realized then meeting him but twice was our family’s loss.
      This narrative would be nothing more than a depressingly sad tale — were it not for the ending.
      On Wednesday, these two girlfriends came together once again in that same hospital to share in the birth of infant Emma Arlene Smith.
      Both girls, now women really, were crying again, but this time sharing a different sort of tears. True, it wasn’t exactly the way Hannah had dreamed about it; it sure didn’t unfold the way Meg had pictured it either.
      So their emotions wavered back and forth between falling in love with an eight-pound angel and struggling to understand God’s sense of timing.
      Did Noel have to leave just then? Really? After all that, three more weeks would have been too much to ask?
      He gave them no answer. But still, both believed there is a mysterious God, and they had just seen the miracle of life. And somehow, somewhere, so had Noel.
Dear God – Way too many leave us way too early. But is there such a thing as the perfect time. May all the departed rest in peace. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘God, give peace to all who are scared’
By George Valadie
October 15, 2010
      We survived Homecoming. That’s the only verb I know to describe it.
      The University of Missouri lays claim to the first such celebration dating back to 1911. So I guess I’ll blame them for all this craziness.
      It really wasn’t all that horrible, it never is. Our kids always have a great time but they never cease to amaze me with their creative themes and even more creative costumes.
      Part of the fun is that the four grades compete with each other in our annual “spirit week” competition. Who’s loudest at the pep rally? Who won the most “wacky Olympics” events? Who won the hallway decorating contest? For which – I might add — some plan longer than they do for their term paper.
      And we wrap up the week-long contest – that doesn’t even have a prize — with who won the “penny wars?” This event involves pennies (good) and dollar bills (bad) and stuffing money into the other classes’ jugs. The goal is collecting as much as we can for a worthy charitable cause.
      This year, our students chose to support “Make a Wish for a Warrior,” of which I had never heard. Specifically, they adopted a 23-year-old military veteran who returned from Iraq with four amputated limbs, is trying to rehab with artificial ones and is in need of a home that is designed to be better suited for his new and unimaginable lifestyle.
      Though difficult to fathom, it just had to be one of those good news / bad news phone calls. Sitting around in their Staten Island home, I envision his parents struggling to make sense of the voice on the other end. “He’s wounded badly, you probably won’t recognize him for a bit, his arms are gone, so are his legs.       His nose is broken, his eardrums are punctured. But he’s alive and he’ll be headed your way.”
      Excited? Scared to death? For a moment, try to imagine that Homecoming! Is there such a thing as “nervous joy?”
      Isn’t that how we feel about most homecomings? They’re upcoming moments of anxious excitement and anticipation preceded by a wealth of emotions.
      How many alumni revisit the old school excited to return but unsure of what the evening will hold?
      Dressed up for a great time, our minds slip into overdrive. Do I look fat? Old? Will they look better? Do I have a good job? Is it good enough? How will it be with my best friends? Awkward and quiet? Or will we still share that same old feeling? Can it ever be the same? Will there still be all those separate groups? Or have we finally grown past that?
      Is there such a thing as “nervous joy?”
      There are other sorts of homecomings. How many wayward children return to their old homefront unsure of what the gathering will hold?
      Surely it was this same sense of anticipation for the prodigal son. And though maybe not quite to that extent, we’ve all had a little taste of that, haven’t we?
      A lowlife at best, forever banned at worst, you can imagine the sorts of fears that ran through his head. Awkward can’t begin to describe how he must have envisioned his homecoming.
      Picture him as he came over the hill, excited to see the homeland, but fearful of the people who lived there, fearful of family.
      Is there such a thing as “nervous joy?”
      And then, when all this earthly foolishness is over – it’s then that we get to that final Homecoming.
      I admire the people that are anxious to get there. But honestly, that’s not me.
      I knew a nun who said she couldn’t wait to go to heaven. And she meant it. Said she had loved the Lord her entire life. Why wouldn’t she want to go? That made sense to me, but I’ve never been in a hurry to get there.
      I admire all those who can stare at death face-to-face, up close and personal. Racked by an illness that won’t let them go, some are able to declare themselves “ready to go.”
      As he headed toward the end, with little quality of life remaining, Nancy swears her father willed himself to cross over whatever it is you cross over. If you knew Pop, you’d agree. He’d lived his life in total control, so there was no reason to think he couldn’t manage this one last decision. I’m just not sure that will be me either.
      My grandfather suffered similarly but he spent his final days in his bedroom, lingering basically, not really here, not really there. One morning, my grandmother awoke to a new feeling, “God, you can have him now,” she prayed. “He’s been ready, but now I am. Thank you for letting him stay.” He left us that day.
      She let her best friend go, that won’t be me either.
      Regardless of one’s vision of the afterlife or the depth of one’s faith, standing on the edge of eternity might be the most anxious homecoming of all.
      Faith and fear. Can there be any better example of “nervous joy?” That will be me for sure.
Dear God – Whether going or staying behind, please give peace to all those who are scared. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Dear God, help us do what you would do’
By George Valadie
October 1, 2010
      I don’t get much of a chance anymore, but one of my favorite things to do in school is teach. Thirty-something years ago, that’s all I ever thought I’d be doing. And 30-something years later, it’s all I want to do.
     My subject is economics. It wasn’t my major nor anywhere near my expertise. We haven’t even done all that well with that topic inside our own family. But I do love introducing the topic to high-schoolers.
     Amid all the current political chaos and hatred in our country, one oft-mentioned topic is the size of the federal debt.
While I teach concepts, I don’t ever proclaim any answers about what we should do. I wouldn’t know any if I wanted to. My task is simpler, to help students try to understand there are positives and negatives tied to most every decision that’s made.
     If they can at least grasp what might happen, hopefully, they’ll be smarter – and more engaged voters — when they elect the elected who will cast the votes that affect their lives.
     I can’t comprehend the full size of the nation’s debt, I’m not sure anyone can. So before we dissect the details, we try to tackle how much money this really is.
     Most of them have heard the debt is in the trillions, so we confirm that right away. It’s currently estimated at $13.4 trillion. Then we have a little fun. So I’ll let you give it a try, too. Here’s how we begin.
     “OK kids, suspend reality for a minute, and picture yourself in a room with 13.4 trillion one-dollar bills.
     “You’ve been assigned the task of counting each one, one at a time, to make sure they’re all there. And because of your skill, you are able to count them one per second.
     “Pretend you don’t need to ever sleep, eat or go to the restroom (that’s the “suspend reality” part.) And you start counting them, one per second, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. No stopping.
     “I know you can do the math if you take the time, but for now, take a guess and tell me how long you think it will take you.
     “Days? Weeks? Months? Years? What do you think?”
     That’s their introduction. So what do YOU think? Take a minute, don’t cheat and do the math, just give it your best educated guess. That’s all I ask them to do.
     Some kids say three months. Others have countered, “Oh no, it will take longer than that, more like four or five years.” One bold student took a stab at 30 years.
Remember, you’re counting non-stop, one per second.
     The correct answer … 420,000 years plus a little more. Every second, every day, all day for 420,000 years = $13.4 trillion.
     OK, now I’ve got their attention.
     I mention it because of a recent news article about the U.S. Treasury Department receiving gifts from citizens – young and old – whose only wish is to donate to the cause of helping reduce that debt. I kid you not!
     Last year alone, the Bureau of the Public Debt reported donors made gifts totaling just over $3 million. Gifts ranged from $354 raised by kids and a bake sale to a lady who left them over $1 million in her will. Are these people crazy? Or are they incredibly patriotic?
     Personally, I am neither of those. And I probably won’t be.
     Since we’re quoting numbers, just so you know, should other givers keep up that same pace of generosity and with no additional debt, we’ll have that deficit erased in a breath over four million years. Oprah’s Debt Diet would be proud.
     But what’s the furor? The arguments on both sides are well-worn. There is the view our government is throwing away our tax dollars on people and businesses who don’t need it or deserve it. For some, they’re too lazy. And for some others, well yes, it’s sad but too bad.
     Should our government try to do everything for everyone with our tax money?      Maybe, but how will we ever pay it back? And just who will have that burden?
     The counter-arguments are just as loud. And felt just as passionately. Is everyone deserving of assistance? Does someone have to deserve help? And if so, who’s going to help them if the government doesn’t? Is it me? Is it you? Or should it be anyone?
     It’s a lot more complicated, which is why I don’t have any answers for my students.      All I know is what feels right to me. Some people need some help. And I haven’t done a whole lot of it.
     Last Sunday’s gospel passage told of poverty-stricken Lazarus and the rich man who ignored him. In the flames of hell, the wealthy man begged for a heavenly messenger for his living relatives, “Tell them this hell thing is real.” All he got was, “Let them listen to the prophets.” Nancy turned to me and said, “We’re in trouble.” I couldn’t argue.
     Who knows, maybe it would be better if the government let us keep more of our taxes so we could each pick and choose among the needy . . . the deserving ones, the ones we know.
     And I’m OK with that. Maybe that is a better way.
     I just wonder if I would.
Dear God – Please help us do what you would do. We don’t always know – and we don’t always want to know. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Tomorrow, I’ll be gripping a little too tight’
By George Valadie
September 17, 2010
      After months of preparing, list-making and re-making those same darn lists not to mention way too many episodes of “Say Yes to the Dress,” the big day is upon us. Tomorrow actually. Our middle daughter, Meg, and I will walk down the aisle.
     We began this venture with her publicly professed desire for a destination wedding for immediate family only. “I can’t take all that fru-fru stuff,” she said. “It’s just not me. What if we all just get away and have something simple on a beach?”
     Over time, she decided fru-fru actually is her. But she promised she’d keep it in the realm of the sane though I’ve learned “sane” is a word that must have different meanings. Their wedding party alone is now as big as the population of some small rural towns.
     We have an inside family joke when any one of us seems to be a little over the top, usually because of their urge to control … well, everything, we say “they’re gripping a little too tight.” We just don’t say it to their face.
     Fittingly enough, the phrase was coined when her older sister was stressing over her own wedding. If you know their mom like I do, it’s a genetic thing.
     You can imagine what it’s been like at our house. So I find myself escaping from all the insanity by thinking back to when she was just a little tyke.
     When Katy was six and Meg was but four, I took them to a golf driving range.      Nancy had mistakenly left me in charge of both and the only way they weren’t going to rat me out was to buy them their own bucket of balls for their own clubs.
     While I was zoned in trying to fix my unfixable swing, Meg started screaming. She had gotten too close to Katy, who, with a more out-of-control swing than mine, had just soundly walloped Meg on the side of her pretty blonde head.
     In typical guy fashion, I was more worried that her yelping might bother the other golfers. I calmed her down with a promise of lunch (that always worked) and we went to great-grandma’s house, who thankfully, had enough sense to look underneath her pretty blonde hair.
     One monster gash to the scalp and several stitches later, she just couldn’t wait to tell her mother.
     She’s still mad at me for that.
     A couple of years later, she and I went out to try to master bike riding on our street. It’s a scene played out by daddies and daughters everywhere.
     We had worked so hard to get her going, me trying to keep up, her trying to keep balanced. I was there beaming with fatherly pride when that little booger took off, cruising pretty dang fast for a first-timer.
     It’s just that, up until that moment of unexpected lift-off, we hadn’t had need to work on the slowing down part all that much. If I remember the scene accurately, the neighbor’s mailbox was what suddenly and shockingly aborted her first bicycle launch.
     She’s still mad at me for that.
     Much later in life, I took a new out-of-town job that forced our family’s first move. Faced with leaving the only friends she had ever known, she tried to make me as miserable as she could.
     When the day came to finally pack up and drive away, she wouldn’t speak to me. Nor the next day. Or the next. The tally climbed to 14 days before she finally cracked. I couldn’t blame her too much, most of the family felt the same way; but they had been nicer. In the end, I know she loved it there since several of her friends from there will walk down this aisle with her.
     But she’s still mad at me for that.
     Once she reached the clinical side of dental school, she discovered that she was responsible for having to find her own patients. And to successfully and completely meet all the standards, she would be required to clean 86 sets of teeth, pull 52 more and then perform an equal number of root canals.
     Meg loves that stuff. But finding the people, scheduling them, and hounding them to show up – well, she’d rather her dad just volunteer. That’s what she wanted.
     So, like the dutiful dad, I volunteered to have my teeth cleaned – twice. I donated one tooth that I was glad to part with but I draw the line at root canals for fun. Half-kidding, half serious, she said, “If I don’t graduate, it will be your fault, you know!”
     She’s still mad at me for that.
     I mention all of it only to make the point that it seems like my 4-year-old became a bride-to-be in a mere matter of moments. Moments I’d give anything to have back – even the painful ones.
     And as much as I have prayed each of my daughters will find the loves of their lives, and as sure as I am that Jeremy is hers, I do dread tomorrow just a little bit. That’s why I’m pretty sure when we start down the aisle, I’ll be the one “gripping a little too tight,” trying to hang on to that little girl and the little piece of my heart she’ll take with her.
     I’ll always be mad at her for that.
Dear God – This day will be the answer to a prayer I’ve already asked. Thank you. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘I will never forget Jeannie or her dad’
By George Valadie
September 3, 2010
     Another school year is open and I’ve been caught up trying to learn all the new faces, the names will have to come later. First, I have to remember those kids who’ve just been gone this summer.
     I won’t admit I’m old, but I sure am getting older.
But I will never forget Jeannie or her dad. And they passed through my life over 25 years ago. I first met them when a local employer had called to say he had a recently laid-off worker with a daughter who really wanted to attend our school. Times were tough then too and he, the boss, had just been forced to cut back his staff, including this particular dad.
     Feeling badly about the whole thing, he phoned to see if I would meet with her and her father to decide if there was any chance this might somehow fit together.
     I think Catholic schools owe every kid that sort of look – it’s what I think we’re all about. He didn’t really know much about the family, but he forewarned me of the obvious — this family would likely be in need of some tuition help if we had any.
     That didn’t scare me, depending on how much it was of course. We were already helping quite a few families plug that last little gap they needed to fill. So we set up the appointment to see where this might go.
     I began by chatting with Jeannie to see how she had come to have this desire to attend our school, especially since the majority of her friends would likely enroll elsewhere.
     She told me all about how her family had moved into our town just a few years ago. Though she had known nothing about us, I was impressed by the fact she had managed to dig and learn. How many sixth graders do that?
     And ever since, she had wanted to attend no other high school. It was no surprise this sort of kid had also been good at bugging her dad about it. Sixth graders are great at asking for stuff but few can grasp the financial differences between an education that’s public (free) and private (a lot).
     Now, three years later, here she was finally ready for high school, equipped with a wisdom of the world she didn’t deserve and an awareness of a family plight she’d rather not live.
     Still, her enthusiasm wasn’t at all dampened. She won me over like few kids ever have. Then I asked her to step outside my office so I might get a chance to talk with her dad about adult sorts of things.
     After a few pleasantries, he and I moved to the necessary but awkward financial part of the conversation. I handed him what was in those days a very brief application form. Less prying and complex than what we demand in 2010.
     I quickly found out that “degree of complexity” isn’t the same for everyone. He seemed reticent to pick it up or even look at it, much less fill it in. I felt sure he was just embarrassed by either his job loss or the small income he would have to tell me about.
     Finally, he awkwardly told me the secret he’d been hoping to protect – he could not read it.
     Trying to act as if that happened all the time at our mostly middle class school, I let him know I’d be able to help him. But I’d need to be asking some pretty personal questions. He nodded and so we began.
     Do you have a spouse? No.
     How many children do you have? Three, er, I mean five.
     Five? Well, my brother, who used to help me with these sorts of things, has two kids but he died. I’m trying to help them.
     What’s your address? I don’t remember. We just had to move because we couldn’t keep paying the rent.
     There were others about investment income, savings and retirement but they were as irrelevant as the final one I didn’t even bother to ask. How much money do you think you can muster for a monthly payment to our school?
     I assured him he’d hear from me, but promised nothing. Our school had no resources to make this happen. I knew it, he knew it too. But Jeannie didn’t. And he would have to tell her.
     That’s the way of the world. People don’t get to have everything they want.      Sometimes the answer is simply “No, we can’t do that.” But I didn’t envy him having to break it to her.
     Then three days later, one of our parents – let’s call them the Smiths — walked in with the darndest miracle I’d ever seen. “My wife and I had a good year and we’ve got      some extra. I’ve got a year’s tuition to donate but I’d like you to help some family who has absolutely no shot.”
     What was last week’s parable? “When you host a banquet, do not invite your relatives or the wealthy … invite the poor, the crippled, the lame — because of their inability to repay you.” And that’s exactly who he invited.
     I can’t imagine all Jeannie overcame to make it through four years but we never saw all that much of her dad after that. I think he felt way too out of place. I don’t know that I wouldn’t have felt the same.
     Still, I’ll never forget that dad’s story, his daughter Jeannie, or the Smith family who never even asked to know their names.
     Dear God – Sometimes the world struggles to believe in you, much less angels unless you’ve gotten to see one. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Hopefully, we might not end up on reality TV
By George Valadie
August 6, 2010
I don’t know about you but I’m not a huge fan of reality TV. But Sarah, our youngest, loves it. The weirder the better.
It’s those tell-all programs I can’t abide. And I’m not sure I’ll ever understand people’s willingness to publicly open up their deepest personal and family flaws for worldwide gawking.
I mean it’s not that we don’t have personal and family flaws. I can’t think of anyone who would want our family tree in their yard. Heck, if they weren’t family, we wouldn’t want it either. But I’m darn sure not going on TV to tell the world.
Still, I find myself giving in to her and letting her watch, which is where I came to learn about hoarding.
Television portrays the most severe cases but as in all things, I’m guessing there must be incremental phases. Surely there are some folks who just “sorta hoard.” Like my wife.
If there is such a thing, she’s a purse hoarder. She doesn’t collect them as much as she collects stuff in them. Lots of stuff. Weird stuff.
She bought a new one the other day and had to come face-to-face with moving her collection of — well, I don’t have a word that accurately depicts such a mess.
So she decided it might be a good time to go through it piece-by-piece and throw out what she no longer needed. I was impressed with her intent until I realized she had settled in to the task without any sort of garbage bag or 55-gallon drum nearby.
And so she began. The first treasures to spill out were some paper hats with the Cinco de Mayo theme. What in the world? “Well, since Katy’s labor was due to be induced that day, I had bought them thinking we could take a picture with the baby and all of us wearing them.”
Thankfully, the birth happened that day but the photos did not. Yet, three months later, she still has the hats. I can’t explain it and neither could she.
Next to tumble out were four pieces of tattered and worn legal paper looking as if they’d been written about the same time as the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Turns out they are her Christmas lists from the last four years reminding her of what she and we have given to family and friends. Regardless of fashion, Katy is not scheduled to get another yellow blouse until 2014.
She had 23 grocery lists from which to choose, I kid you not. Saves her time I guess. What’s for dinner, honey? “List 17.”
To efficiently save our grocery money, she has a coupon holder case —which was empty. Later she found a rubber-band full of grocery coupons, that had all expired.
She had five tubes of lipstick, a broken eye-liner and a bone-dry container of facial powder which she claims she’s keeping with her so she’ll know what shade to buy when she replenishes.
She won’t get any from me, I bought her some in 2008 and it’s not time yet.
She had five swatches of fabric for a chair we’ve already reupholstered. And underneath those she found hotel credit card receipts for places we stayed long ago. I think she might be holding on to them in case she decides to ‘return our vacation’ if she ever decides maybe we didn’t really like that trip. Any other reason you can think of?
She has a big bottle of sunscreen for me though I didn’t know it. She found quite a few loose ibuprofen pills buried at the bottom but it would take an hour to dig them out. Those must be for her slow-building headaches.
She owns a bottle of medicine she doesn’t like taking and swears she never will. Along with another she really does like but it had expired before the coupons.
I’m always losing my special sort of favorite writing pen she always swears she hasn’t taken. But ahha! I caught her trying to sneak it out of this purse because she giggles when she knows she’s guilty. Keep digging, I bet there are more, I challenged. She only found eight of them.
And of course there’s the usual stuff — an overstuffed wallet but that’s another story, a checkbook, some extra eyeglasses, an emery board and two Sonic peppermints circa 1997.
This is a dark and scary place I just will not go. Do you have a few dollars, dear? Yeah, just get it out of my purse. That’s not happening so I always bring it to her and let her reach into this hole of mysterious shadows. Left to me, I’d rather go without.
OK, I admit, hanging on to goofy stuff isn’t just a female gene. Guys have their own personal collections of weirdness for sure. We just don’t carry it all with us wherever we go.
But looking back at a good bit of these contents, it’s what mothers and wives do. They take care of others. The sunscreen and several of those meds are for when I’ve forgotten to take mine at home. I certainly would have never thought about the grandbaby’s decorations and I wouldn’t know what we gave our girls last week, much less last year.
So I’m grateful they’ve got our backs and they keep trying to fix us. That way, hopefully, we might not end up on reality TV.
Dear God - People care in all sorts of ways. May we be always grateful that someone just does. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘God cut us parents loose without a manual’
By George Valadie
July 9, 2010
      What’s your teenager doing this summer? Playing some ball? Summer school? Maybe the beach? Earning a few bucks for college?      Or to pay you back for the cell bill that had gone berserk?
How about that first trip out of the driveway without you beside them? Abby Sunderland just had that experience – sort of.
     As a high school principal of 1,000 teenagers, and a father of three daughters, I couldn’t help but be distantly interested in the recent news accounts of this 16-year-old lunatic – or adventurer. Call her what you will, I can’t decide.
     She’s the California teen who earned her personal 15 minutes of fame by attempting to sail around the globe – by herself. Ponder that for a minute.
     We’re talking about sailing 20,000 miles around the planet in a mere 50 feet or so of boat. Alone. I’m not sure which is more amazing. All that or the fact she had no other silly 16-year-olds to go to the bathroom with her or anyone to save her life either.
     But before she succeeded, she ran into an Indian Ocean “rogue wave.” Or perhaps it’s more accurate to say it ran into her. And over her. And all around her. Snapping her mast in half and forcing an end to her excursion – and almost her life.
     I’ve read editorials, blog posts, and letters-to-the-editor from sources as varied as National Public Radio to the local weekly newspaper from Marina del Rey. Most focus on her parents but each is as different as the source from which it comes. And, as you can guess, I’ve heard about it from my wife. She’ll want me to tell you she thinks those people are out of their minds.
     Regardless of what you think about her parents and the sanity of this insanity, I can still admire a few things about this young lady.
Sixteen years old, I couldn’t help but think back to that time in our own daughters’ lives. Though fearless on the water, Addy doesn’t yet have her driver’s license and has admitted some apprehension in learning because she thinks the roads are dangerous. That’s what I’d call an ironic common sense.
     She wasn’t topside (I use that term as if I’ve ever been in or on a sailboat) at the time of the storm. She was below deck working on the engine. Let me quote the young lady, “My first thought was to jury rig … I was thinking if I could get the boom on deck I could rig up something, but my boom had snapped in half (too), so there was nothing left.”
     My first question is – does anyone think she learned that while tweeting, texting or updating her Facebook status? I would have given away most anything we owned – including one of our girls – if just one of them could have fixed a clutch. Oh no, instead      I heard “Da-a-a-a-a-ddy, it’s broken again.”
     But to their credit, ours have faced down crises of their own. I remember when Katy took two friends and the family van for her senior year spring break trip. Along the way, the top half of our car top carrier blew right off.
     Let me quote our eldest. I think hers went more like this. “Dad, my first thought was just to ‘jury rig’ … I was thinking if I could get the top back on I could rig up something, but the only thing I had was a McDonald’s straw … That worked for a few miles but my straw snapped in half, so there was nothing left.”
     Imagine that, honey. Then what? “It blew off again, and we just took the bottom half off too and left the whole darn thing along I-75 somewhere in southern Georgia.”
     I kid you not. Not to be outdone in composure or competence, I remember the morning Meg called my cell while I was in a meeting at school. I excused myself in a panic since she was in one. Crying hysterically, unable to speak, that non-stop sobbing where they can’t even breathe – and then you can’t either.
     Katy was with her too. I deciphered enough to know it involved her car. I could tell they were both alive but I wasn’t sure about anyone else.
     Ultimately, she was calling to tell me her car wouldn’t start. And she had no money.      And no more credit. Dental school had sapped her cash, sleep, energy and as it seemed had finally claimed both her sanity and perspective.
     “I can’t take it anymore,” she wailed. “We’ve tried everything and it won’t even make a sound.” I tried to talk her down off the ledge, and offered the very little I knew about starting a car. “Did you leave the lights on?” No, Dad – more crying.      “Could be an alternator, they’re not too much.” More crying.
     “Meg, you do have the car in park, don’t you?”
     “Meg? (nothing), Meg? (nothing), Meg?” More hysteria only this time it was the laughing variety. No longer teens and still, neither seemed ready for the road, much less the open seas.
     The questions seem unanswerable. Were these parents setting her free to achieve her goals? Or just negligent fools? Alexander the Great conquered the eastern half of the world at 16. But how many kids arrive in a college dorm unable to balance a checkbook or do their laundry?
     I won’t lie, I have my concerns, but I resolved long ago that I don’t know nearly enough to tell other parents how to parent. But I wouldn’t mind if they’d come teach mine to work on an engine.
Dear God – You cut us parents loose without a manual. Please forgive me because this is one of those times I wonder what you were thinking. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘I like vacation dad better, too’
By George Valadie
June 11, 2010
      Sing with me. “Schooooool’s out for summer!” Louder this time. “Schoooooool’s out for summer!”
     Alice Cooper was never one of my musical favorites, I’m more of a Carole King sort of fan. But I’ve always liked this one song of his.      Well, that’s not really true, I don’t even know any of the other lyrics in it, but I do love that one phrase.
     “Schooooooool’s out for summer!”
     And so here we are at the beginning of one of my favorite seasons for being a high school principal. But I’m not the only one.
     Our own three kids have long talked about their two different dads.
     There’s the me they’ve known most of their lives, the one they just call “dad.” And then there’s the other me they call “vacation dad.”
     They tease me about how it’s so obvious. They say I laugh more. That I relax better. They’ve actually told me I become a happier person. And I was sure I was already a pretty happy guy.
     They’ll come in our house, walk right past me into the kitchen and ask, “Hey mom, is ‘vacation dad’ here?”
     Nancy’s never been opposed to jumping on any train that runs over me; so she joins right in with them. In her view, she says she can actually see school “seeping out” of me as the day-to-day eases up a bit.
     I try to put up a front pretending none of them know what they’re talking about but her vote makes four-out-of-four, it’s unanimous, and so true.
     Still I made them tell me about times when I’ve been all that much different.
     “Well, do you remember the vacation dad that wore a Santa hat for 600 miles – waving at everyone on the interstate. You even wore it when we stopped for lunch at that Wendy’s. We were inside with people.”
     “Yeah, and vacation dad switches diets from salads and grilled chicken to chips with cheese and burgers with grease. And don’t forget those mudslides you like to drink.”
     “My favorite is the vacation dad that takes us out to eat on the spur of the moment.” (That’s true, but I also do that anytime Nancy breaks out a can of salmon for dinner.)
     “And don’t forget that goofy dance that vacation dad breaks into. The one we’ve banned you from doing in public. Ever.”
     Their teasing aside, they have a point. And I can tell they much prefer this laid back version of me.
     And when I think about it, their everyday dad has always gone to work at a job and a school working with some great kids. How tough can that be really!?!
     With a little time for reflection though, I’ve decided it’s never had anything to do with the specifics of my job. I just think I’m one of those people who grips a little too tight onto the events of the workday. And when I get home, I always find them still there in my pockets along with the change and the keys.
     Do you ever do that?
     I’m hoping so, I’d hate to think I’m out there all alone.
     I suppose living life that way can at times be a good thing. In a day and time when employers are looking for employees who give their all – and then some – the way-too-tight-grippers among us have surely earned a check-plus or two. Haven’t we?
     But then again, I read a quote that says …“The man who doesn’t relax and voluntarily hoot a few hoots now and then, is in great danger of someday hooting hoots for the edification of a doctor.”
     Though we apparently don’t hoot nearly enough for them, I think our families are proud of the work we do, but I also think they – my crew at least – have always liked their “vacation dad” a little bit better.
     No, they’ve liked him a whole lot better. I suppose I do, too.
     Sadly, it occurs to me these silly stories they tell might also reflect what will be some favorite memories of their old man. All my worries, stress and distractions? Not so much.
     How crazy are we for holding on to all that stuff we’d be better off leaving at the office? The shop? The lab? The store? Wherever?
     Hopefully, you’re a lot less like me than me. Hopefully, you can turn off your job at night or at least on weekends. Hopefully, you’re not two people inside of one.
     But if you are, I hope you have a great summer. Yours may not be exactly like mine. Most folks’ summers don’t provide as dramatic a difference as being a teacher does. Still, I hope it seeps out of you – whatever it is — at least for a little while.
     We’ll always have more work to get back to.
     Until then, let’s hoot a few hoots now and then.
     Dear God –We’ve been known to cheat ourselves – and those who love us – out of the best of who we are. Mostly for reasons we don’t even see we but will regret – when it’s too late. Please let the blind man see one more time. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Sometimes written thank you hits spot
By George Valadie
May 21, 2010
   For all those who do what I do for a living, it has to be one of the highlights.
   I know it was for me.
   After our graduation ceremony the other night, I was making the usual rounds through the crowds, congratulating seniors and their parents.
   We’ve got quite a few so – amid all that chaos – there was no way I could see them all. Still, it’s nice seeing a room full of nothing but smiles.
   Well, maybe not all smiles. But even the few tears that flowed seemed as if they were leaking excess from hearts that just couldn’t contain that much joy.
   After most had made their way on to the family dinners and parties that awaited, one of our senior guys and his folks were still hanging around.
   He didn’t say a lot, just walked up and handed me an envelope that had my name on the front. He offered little other than, “This is for you.” And he was gone like the rest.
   I thanked him, stuck it in my back pocket, and headed toward the mess in the back room that still needed to be cleaned up before we left the church.
When I remembered I had it, though not until the next day, I read what turned out to be a really nice two-page letter he had hand-written.
   He was thanking me for all he thought I had done which is always nice to hear. He had taken the time to express how much he had enjoyed his time at our school and very kindly gave me some credit for his accomplishments and those of his classmates.
   It was very flattering – though I don’t know how accurate.
   I had to laugh to myself because I was thinking that any kid who has the manners and thoughtfulness to even think about writing such a note – much less take the time to actually do it – is a kid who has been responsible for much of his own success.
   I won’t lie though, it felt really nice.
   But then I had to take pause. How many times this year – or even in the last few – have I taken the time to do what he did? On how many occasions have I been as classy as he just was?
   How many times have I reached out to someone whom I felt had made a difference in my life or that of my children? Or the person who simply went a little out of their way?
   People do it, I just don’t tell them. And I put all the blame on e-mail. Then I use it.
   Thank yous. Atta boys. And whatever else I can fire off in a few minutes.
   I use it because reaching out this way is a lot less embarrassing and a lot less expensive. My computer’s spell- and grammar-checks pull me back from the brink of abusing the English language. Not to mention the resulting postage and waste when    I start over – and over – and over on yet one more note card that come just eight to a box.
   But the primary reason I think I use e-mail – and most others do too – is the immediacy with which it gets things where we want them to go. Sometimes it’s too immediate.
   A thought enters my head; I knock out a quick note; fix the mistakes; and then it’s gone. Oftentimes all this happens in less than a minute. Sadly, my important thoughts take no more than five.
   I receive a lot of those too. We all do.
   In my younger days, before such technology, I can recall sitting down late at night to pour out my heart on paper. I’ve written page after page. I think we all have.
   At times, I’ve expressed my undying – and maybe unknown – love. While on other late nights, all that ink has released a bucketful of pent up anger.
   Once, my wife did it. Feeling that I had been wounded and cheated by my boss, Nancy took pen in hand and let it fly. Legal pad pages were flying everywhere – lots of them.
   The only part that still sticks in my mind even today was the part where she said somebody had the “finesse of a baboon.” I’m not sure to whom she was referring, but regardless, it wasn’t likely to gain me any favors.
   And thankfully, very thankfully, the post office wasn’t open at that hour. So night turned into day; darkness into sunlight; anger to perspective; she shelved it in a drawer and I’m pretty sure saved my job.
   Maybe we’ve all done such things.
   But seldom does the process work that way anymore.
   Oh we still write with every bit as much passion – about love and hate. Pounding and crying on the keyboard in the dead of night. But now, and this is the scary part, when we finish all this outpouring, it takes but one more click to launch it on its way.
   And so we do with no reflection, and no sunlight.
   One click doesn’t take much time and it doesn’t give us any either. No time to think. No time to consider. No time to reflect.
   Dear God – Time – it might be your most precious gift. Eternity – where there’s plenty of it. Please help us use ours to get to yours. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

If we could re-live a bit, what would you pack?
By George Valadie
May 7, 2010
    “Have you packed that bag yet?” he keeps asking. It’s been bugging him for the longest time. Maybe there will be no sudden need, but maybe there will.
    As I have written before, our eldest, Katy, and her husband, Clint, are expecting their first child. With the exception of a few really weird oddities that bother nobody else on the planet but Katy, these are two of the most laid back people I know. They’re perfect for each other.
    To their credit, and I must admit to my amazement, they decided they should attend all those sorts of birth preparation classes first-time parents probably should attend. There was that weekly series on the childbirth process itself, the one-nighter on childcare (seems like that part would take longer) and infant CPR, and they’ve even been to the pre-baptism class at our church.
    Way back when, I recall Nancy and I going to classes on the Lamaze method of birthing one’s baby. I’ll be honest, I couldn’t take it seriously. Her breathing thing made me laugh, but mostly because she had no intention of having our child this way.
She had been pretty clear to her doctors. She wanted drugs and lots of them. And Katy is her mother’s child in this regard. But all that’s done now minus that one miraculous moment we’re anxiously anticipating. Except for one thing. He can’t get her to pack that darn bag.
    Clint’s preparing for every possibility. He mostly knows what to do when it happens. But he’s come to understand that she might need to go straight from work, or when they’re having burgers, or during one of her many trips to Target.
    Turns out one of their instructors had suggested that moms pack a “bag” with two kinds of ingredients – the specific clothes she’ll want to wear home and the specific clothes she’ll want her baby to wear home.
    And now I understand his stress. Clint’s figured out if she hasn’t packed that bag herself, he will then have the unenviable task of running home from the hospital to grab up a few things for mom and baby to wear.
    He knows how this is gonna go. “Honey, just get that cute blue thing we got at the shower, the one with the matching hat and booties. Just don’t get that other one that’s like it. And grab my favorite outfit. Hurry!”
    Heck, we all know how this is gonna go. I’ve been in that closet. He’ll be staring at a sea of baby blueness with only a lottery type chance of being right. And he will not know his wife’s favorite outfit – not now, not then, not ever. And certainly not on hormones.
    He’s petrified and he wants her to be the one to pack the bag. I’m on his side of this.
    This absurdity became a topic of conversation for our entire family. And all of a sudden, her sister Meg, who lives in Little Rock, decided she needed to have one packed as well, because she’s apparently climbing in her car as soon as she gets the call.
    Thankfully, her other sister Sarah, lives here in the same city. She once went out of town with us to attend a family funeral, the only event on our agenda and the only reason for our trip. She packed lots, but nothing that really worked for a funeral.
    Nancy and I are going to be there as well. Not knowing how long the fun might last, she’s apparently packing extra coins for the Diet Coke machine.
    Amid this chaos, the thought occurred to me we’re preparing to say good-bye to another class of high school graduates.
    To borrow the obvious analogy, we’re giving birth to students who will – for the first time — step into a far different world than the one they’ve known to this point.
    And I can’t help but wonder if they’ll leave our home of sorts with bags properly and completely packed.
    No doubt we’ve had a role in making sure they possess what they need. But so have their parents. And their family. And their pastors. But it is they who will need to pack. And it is they who must decide what – and what not — to take.
    If I may offer a suggestion or two, I’d recommend a few of the following.
    English and Empathy. An Open Mind and an Honest Soul. A sense of when to write, when to text and when to call. Family and Friends. A sense of humor, responsibility and common sense. Lots of common sense.
    A computer, an Ipod, a cell phone and a pencil sharpener. Science and Values. Morals and Math. Sheets and towels and underwear. An understanding of when to say no and when to say yes. And when it’s OK to “get back with you later.”
    Money and Discipline. Motivation and Inspiration. Goals and Dreams. And that prayerful knowledge of where God is and how they can find him when they need him.
    Pick your own but those are a good start, I guess. Which begs the questions — if we could re-live a bit of our own lives again, what would we pack this time?
    Dear God – It’s a crazy place out there. Please walk with all of them. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Does a bunch of stuff give a baby a head start?
By George Valadie
April 23, 2010
   They’ve got everything you could possibly have. And if they don’t, the mom-to-be just casually mentions it and one of the Grandmas-to-be – usually both — race to the store.
   Between the baby showers and two manic grandmothers, I don’t see how it’s possible that any young pregnant couple is more prepared for a newborn than our daughter and her husband.
   Well, except for maybe that whole “what do we do when he actually gets here” part. They might be a little lacking there. Her parents sure were. But if a bunch of baby stuff gives a kid a head start, this little guy is halfway to wherever he’ll want to go. Katy wonders how she survived us. We do too.
   She’s due in three weeks and she and Clint have already sterilized the baby bottles – all 42 of them – in their high tech bottle sterilizer that sits next to the rocket ship shaped bottle warmer that shames what her parents provided for her and her sisters.
   In retrospect, I’m pretty sure the only sterile thing in any of our kids’ lives was the delivery room in which they entered the world. After that, they lived in our house.
   I wouldn’t have known about the sterilizer had I not seen all the bottles spread out on the specialized bottle drying rack. Picture a tiny plastic Christmas tree with bottles stuck on the end of each and every limb to drip and dry.
   I couldn’t help but think back to the hundreds of times we all went on a late-night bottle search. “Here it is,” someone would exuberantly holler, reaching far underneath our couch.”OK, blow the dust off of it, fill that sucker with some Tab and get it in here.”
   They also have a “pack ‘n play.” It’s a changing table, a napper (I don’t have a clue), a baby bed and a play pen, that Clint affectionately calls the cage. This isn’t one collapsible piece; this is four big collapsible pieces. Throw in a storage bin that hangs on the side and a computer keyboard for the front that makes the whole thing sway, sing and light up in the dark.
   The best part is that all of this magically condenses into a carry bag that looks as if you’re hauling your lawn chair to a picnic, though I don’t think anyone will be able to pick it up.
   If they don’t accidentally pack him too, I’m told he himself will be transported in his new travel system. Seriously. A travel system. I think we used to lug our kids.
   Yes, we had a stroller, a car seat and a carrier but I knew what these were. I think this system thing includes all those items but for some reason, they’ve been engineered to somehow mesh together to make an Audi.
   His nursery is so cute, but it’s equipped with devices that necessitate a computer science degree, not a nanny. Baby monitors existed in our day, but we couldn’t afford them, and might not have bought one if we could. Putting them and their screams in one room, and us in another, seemed like a good idea back in the day.
   Today’s monitors claim a 2,000-foot range which occurs to me equals almost seven football fields. And what mother has ever let her newborn get that far away!
   There’s a baby bed that apparently can someday convert into a little tike’s big-boy bed and then later on to a king-size for when he has the entire baseball team over for his first slumber party. Currently, it’s full of so many stuffed animals there’s no room for the baby, but they’ll figure that out, won’t they?
   They have a baby dresser that also serves as a changing table and it elegantly matches the rich dark decor of the baby bed. Ours was more of a nouveau Salvation Army.
   They don’t yet own a baby wipes warmer though Nancy seems determined to get him one. My wife believes it’s important to minimize the cold shock on the little booger’s bottom as that will apparently decrease his ACT score.
   There’s a gizmo that looks like the rocket ship shaped bottle warmer but this one shoots a laser light show onto the ceiling that’s synchronized to jungle music which can become a rainstorm matched up with a rock-a-bye lullaby.
   They already own eight orthodontic pacifiers designed with extra airflow for sensitive skin and a pacifier carry case which I can only imagine will need a little sterilizer of its own. It’s a far cry from, “Don’t forget to put her ‘pacy’ in your pocket.    We don’t want to get home without that thing.”
   But the topper is a “tinkle, tinkle little star” protective cover designed to be placed on top of baby boys while changing them as protection from unexpected geyser-type eruptions. Thankfully, our girls never needed that.
   Poor Clint! I had to laugh. When I stole a peek into the closet, there buried in the back were all of his favorite childhood Houston Astros baseball pennants. Apparently, these lack the required cuteness factor to hang in his own son’s nursery. I can’t wait until he brings out the mounted fish he’ll want to hang.
   Thankfully, we could sit and laugh about the absurdity of it all. These are two parents who understand how incredibly blessed their infant will be. Nancy said it best,    “Think of the babies born in a hut. All they have is their mom. And that’s all they ever have.”
   That’s so very true. Little Brady has a decent shot to make it in this crazy world. We should pray for all those little ones whose lives are not nearly so. We really should.
   Dear God – Ten fingers and 10 toes would be really great. Please. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Have you struggled to see your life more clearly?
By George Valadie
April 9, 2010
    Amazingly, we – all of us – were just moments away from walking out the door.         Together. We were actually going to be on time. That’s the way it should be on Easter morning. Seems like everybody should make it to that Mass on time. Well, every Sunday really, but especially on Easter.
    But Sunday morning timeliness, complete with family peace and joy, has never been all that easy – at least not at our house.
    But there we were – smart and smiling — when I dropped my eyeglasses. Frame went one way, lens went another. And I said something not very Easterly.
    First, I tried to force it all back together. I’d been able to do that all the time with my previous pair, but looking back, I think the fact I needed to do it all the time was why I got rid of them.
    My next attempt was to grab our tiniest knife with its sharpest point to see if I could surgically repair them. That proved frustratingly unsuccessful because I couldn’t even see the head of the darn screw without my glasses.
    My last attempt at salvaging the situation was to conduct a mad but futile search for my previous pair.
    You know how it is when you get new glasses. You bring home the old ones though you know you’ll never wear them again. You keep them around the house because of a possible need that seldom occurs. And then, when it does happen, you have absolutely no idea where they are. So off we went.
    I can never keep track of whether I’m near— or far-sighted but I suffer from whichever one means I struggle to crisply and clearly see all the way across the church. I can see life around me, but just not all that clearly.
    And then our pastor began his homily.
    Though gospel versions differ, one consistent theme each Easter morning is that a small number of men and women had all gone to the tomb. Peter, Mary Magdalene and John were among others. Each had known Jesus in their own way and each was left standing there in their own sense of confusion. What exactly just happened here?
    His death just days before had been shocking enough. A week ago he had ridden into town as the celebrated hero. Don’t you know his friends, family and followers were completely freaked out.
    He had spent his adult life getting them ready, but they had never been entirely sure for just what. No matter what he had told them, you just know they had to have been convinced he was the king for whom they had waited.
    But he had mixed lectures and parables. And even with 2000 years of reflection, we still don’t fully understand what those stories were completely all about. What must it have been like for them — in real time?
    And then, to top off their confusion, the rock had been moved, the tomb had been entered, the body had been taken. Or so they had to have believed.
    Can we blame them? After all, they’d never seen anyone rise from the dead on their own. You can imagine their questions. If Jesus wanted to live, why didn’t he just do whatever it was he needed to do to avoid the whole crucifixion thing to begin with.
    It seems they could see life around them, but just not all that clearly.
    Who hasn’t been right there struggling to see our lives clearly? Especially when what we do see can often look like nothing more than chaos at its best!
    It happens in so many ways, on so many fronts. We feel for the person who loses a job after loyally serving for — not years — but decades. Maybe there was a reason, maybe not. When a voice claims “it’s just business,” is that a sin to be forgiven? Or can something really be “just business?”
    It was painful to watch. She had long worked for a business that had called themselves “family.” In her lengthy tenure, children had been born, parents had been lost. Generations had come and gone.
    It was no longer the same business she had entered but can anyone name one that is? Or that should be? Perhaps it needed to have changed even more. But when she was removed, well, it’s a wound from which she has yet to recover – if she ever will.
    Christ came to convey a whole new way of seeing the world so that the kingdom might also exist now, and not just in a future we can’t imagine. And he got killed for it.
    Was there a lack of loyalty on the part of his friends? Or were they just a necessary piece of the puzzle he came here to complete?
    As for her job loss, was it her company’s failure to see life clearly? Or was it her own inability to appreciate the important things in her life? And this job might not have been one of them.
    How can we know this stuff? The disciples of Jesus had the perfect teacher and they couldn’t see clearly.
Sometimes neither can we.
    Dear God – We try to understand you but we have been known to make it a real challenge for ourselves. Imagine that. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Panic set in . . . I forgot my wife’s birthday
By George Valadie
March 26, 2010
    It seemed like any other day when I got out of bed.
    My routine sure began the same – stumbling and showering, shampooing and shaving, dressing and then driving to school. No one will ever accuse me of having bright-eyed mornings, I even struggle on Christmas. So when I manage to handle all those needs in that precise order, my day is starting well.
    Nancy and I work at the same school, reporting at the same hour, so we get ready each morning in more or less the same time window. Because she knows me, she allows me to graze through the house in silence, though we do have our one simple “good morning” routine.
    I sputter out, “Let’s stay home and play hooky today.” She replies with “I will if you will.” And then we both get ready and head out the door.
I knew this would be a little different day though since a doctor’s appointment had been added to my mid-morning calendar.
    It was a return visit to my dermatologist, two in less than a week. They had diagnosed a basal cell something or other and they had plans to dig at it until I didn’t have it anymore. No fun, but apparently better than allowing it to sit and marinate.
    Before I checked out of school for the appointment, I swung by Nancy’s desk more than a few times as I always do. Can you get this file for me? Can you find that kid for me? Call me if you need me. It was nothing special, just like any other day.
    When I arrived at the doctor’s office, they called me to the counter and handed me one of those dreaded clipboards with three or four very blank pages on them.
You know the ones. They wanted to know everything about my body, including some parts     I don’t have any more, and problems that were long ago healed. I used to know all the answers but not so much anymore. I’ve either forgotten or don’t carry some nine-digit number with me.
    Turns out they were converting all their patients’ records to a new computer system and were using this opportunity to update all the same questions I had answered several years ago.
    I don’t know what it says about my life that I answered every single question exactly as I did back then. Same house, same phone, same emergency contacts and same wife – though that last part was about to get dicey.
    As is always the case, the last two things they require are a signature and the day’s date. Fill in the boxes, sign below.
    And that’s when I realized this was not any other day.
G-e-o-r-g-e V-a-l-a-d-i-e … M-a-r-c-h 1-8.
    Picture a cartoon strip thought balloon: “Hmmm, you know, George, this seems like a date that should mean something? What is it?
    “Did I have another appointment back at school that I’ve forgotten about? Nah, I don’t think so.”
    “March 18, what could that be? St. Patrick’s Day was yesterday, so that’s not it.”
    “I know that tomorrow is the feast of St. Joseph but I don’t think that’s what’s gnawing at me. What could it be?”
    Let me pause here to say that – other than the holy days of the church — I can’t recall the date of any other saintly feast. I have no idea why this has stuck in my mind all these years. But from somewhere in the depths of who knows where, that factoid was rising to the surface when ….
    “Oh my God, it’s Nancy’s birthday!”
    Sometimes people utter God’s name because it’s just what comes spilling thoughtlessly out of their mouths. And sometimes it’s the most devout of prayers. I’ve been guilty of the former but this was most surely the latter.
    I forgot my wife’s birthday.
    I don’t know how that might play in other homes, but for me, panic set in. I began to formulate a plan to call her as soon as I was clothed again.     So while lying there, with time to plot, I began to imagine the excuses I might invent or the conversation that might likely result.
    But I was guilty and there was no escaping it. Mature or not, I schemed as I did when I was 10 and broke one of mom’s dishes. Rather than ‘fess up, I concocted a ploy to hide it at the bottom of the stack, convincing myself she would never find it. But then she did. And she called my name. And well, my name was about to be called once again.
    Thankfully, Nancy was a princess. Rather than being eaten up with anger, she had spent the morning laughing to herself, knowing I’d remember her sooner or later. She knew I loved her. But she had definitely enjoyed the thought of my freaking out.
    Later, we enjoyed a dinner together where she openly laughed about it. Gracious, loving and forgiving, she asked when I actually did remember. Which was when I felt comfortable enough to tell her about the doctor and the date thing.
    Oh why couldn’t I stop myself there? I assumed the evening had been going well enough that I could now confess to her that I had actually recalled the feast of St. Joseph long before I ever thought about her birthday.
    And I had almost survived the day!
Dear God — Thank you for people who love – and forgive. Please make me one. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`Parts of Scripture confound me’
By George Valadie
March 12, 2010
     I’ll be the first to admit that there are parts of Holy Scripture that confound me.
     I struggle with understanding some of the passages, particularly those letters written to the ancient communities. I just get lost in the language. The words are certainly poetic, just difficult for me to comprehend at times.
     That being said, I much prefer the Gospels. In spite of the frustrating challenge of hoping to emulate our heroic lead character, they very much grab and inspire me.
     He died for all of us but spent so much of his days advocating for the least among us.      I’m so far from being him, but I think I’m generally an underdog kinda guy, in a weird sort of way.
     I pull for sports upsets every weekend. For those who can recall it, I loved the “A-Team,” that long-ago TV series in which the plot wasn’t all that great but it always concluded with some serious revenge for the guys who deserved it.
     In my daily life, I give a little bit of money to the people who don’t have any for the very simple reason they just don’t have any; even if some are scamming me. At school I enjoy seeing our struggling students achieve what they never thought was possible as much as watching the brightest shine ever brighter.
     I really struggle with arrogance, recoiling in fear when I’m accused of it. And I love it when hypocrites get caught in their hypocrisy. When Christ said, “Go ahead and cast the first stone,” I wish I’d been there. I would have loved to have seen their faces though I can’t tell you I wouldn’t have been right in the middle of that gang, the same hypocritical gang I detest.
     But I have to admit I’ve always hated those few verses we read each year about the Prodigal Son. Even though just a parable, it long bothered me and my senseof fairness. I mean it really bothered me. Which I suppose is exactly what he intended.
     It’s interesting how that chapter begins. There’s Christ doing what he always did, sitting and teaching among all sorts of people. But on that day, the Pharisees attacked him for having reached out and eaten with the sinners.
     As for the parables with which he responded, it appears he agreed — these folks really were sinners, just in need of some help. First he told of the shepherd who faced losing one of his sheep. “What man among you … would not leave the 99 in the desert and go after the lost one until he finds it?”
     I get that. I’m sure they did too. I’ve gone frantically searching for our lost dog running loose in the neighborhood. And just like he said I would, when I got home with him nipping at my heels once again, there was a bit of a celebration.
     “I tell you, in just the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous people who have no need of repentance.” Our other well-behaved dog didn’t seem to mind all the fuss not in the least. Maybe that’s why I could be OK with this particular story.
     Then Christ moved on to the next parable of the woman who lost some of her money. I definitely get this one too. Have you ever left home with a $20 bill and then later couldn’t find it. I have. Can there be a sicker feeling?
     True story — as embarrassing as it is to admit — I once dropped an envelope with $400 cash inside at a Krystal hamburger parking lot. We drove 45 minutes down the highway, realized our stupidity, and in spite of the impossible odds, drove 45 minutes back. And found it right where we dropped it. Imagine that celebration!
     “What woman having 10 coins and losing one would not light a lamp and sweep the house … and when she does find it, she calls together her friends and family (to rejoice.) In just the same way … there will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
     But the final tale of the three, the prodigal son, just rubs me the wrong way. Same theme, different details. Son A messes up, Son B is a saint. Son A returns in humiliation. Dad is tickled, throws a whopper of a party and Son B acts like a … well, he acts like I most likely would have.
     “But now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.”
     Somebody tell me the difference in these three parables. Because to me, this story feels so much differently. Initially I arrogantly imagined myself as Son B, the good kid who got the bad deal. That was a big part of the problem. I did a little better when I empathized with Son A, but not much. Though I could feel thankful to be home, I still felt sorry for my brother. He’s right; he got cheated.
     And then I pretended being the Dad. Well, actually, I became the Dad and the words of our Savior became so much clearer. And what if you’re the father of all humanity? “He was lost and has been found.” Even just one. Imagine that celebration!
     Dear God — Thank you for everything that shakes us up. We don’t like it, but we need it. More than we admit. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Sometimes we get chance to make it right
By George Valadie
February 26, 2010
     We bought our first Toyota in 1999. And I loved it, still do, actually.
    Like most, I think I just loved the smell. And the fact every square inch of the sleek new interior fabric was actually still attached to the sides and the roof. Because we once owned a big red bomb where the back seat was more like a tent.
    Imagine a cross between Lawrence of Arabia and the bed sheets you used to hang over your dining room chairs on a rainy afternoon. That was the Valadie car back seat.
    We tried to sell the kids on all the imaginary adventures they could be having back there. But you know it’s bad when your six- and eight-year-olds are embarrassed by your car. We ultimately resorted to push pins when the rear-view mirror could no longer produce a view of the rear.
    We used to drive another old clunker – before clunkers were cool — that fell apart on the outside. We didn’t use our trunk space all that much because it was there we were storing all the various pieces that had come off at one time or another. A little chrome siding here, an emergency brake handle there.
    Needless to say, I loved that new Toyota. She’s grown on me even more because she survived the years even though there’s not a soul in our house who understands a single thing about cars. Give me the keys, somebody else has to handle the rest. Including that little red “Check Engine” light that’s been lit since 2004.
    This love affair has grown because she lasted long enough for us to pass it on to our youngest who drives it still today, even with all of its 230,000+ miles. As for cars, Sarah knows less than we do but still, it continues to safely get her where she needs to go.
    All of that inspired us to buy another new Camry last summer not long after my two oldest daughters had each bought one for themselves.
    So I really don’t know what to think about this whole recall thing. Sticking accelerators are a life and death issue though I’m not worried nearly as much about a floor mat I can remove whenever I want.
    There’s an interesting and frightening history of product recalls. You know the news.     There are those that could have killed us even if used as intended. Peanuts with salmonella and heart pacemakers with defective batteries. Or those others that are never supposed to make it inside any of us but sometimes do such as lead paint toys or tiny little pieces that choke tiny little people.
    Regardless of their companies’ reasons, these consumer products were all recalled. A do-over so to speak. A chance to get it right. A “surely we can do better than that.”
    As we wonder whether these were the result of accident or oversight, laziness or greed, it begs a related question. Is there anything we’d like to recall in our own lives?     Maybe not so much product related, but are there any decisions for which we’d gladly welcome one more chance? To try to do better than that?
    I know I have more than can be counted. We let our girls skate by way too easily in their youth. Now one won’t cook, one won’t eat vegetables, and one has always thought her parents should be recalled.
    We did take our kids to church, but I don’t think we helped them see the importance of our faith nearly enough. Those occasional Sundays we skipped didn’t help all that much.     And though it’s one thing to have faith, I don’t feel I’ve grown in mine nearly enough.
    I’ve given away too many hours to my job and not nearly enough to my family. There are people I can’t seem to forgive. And don’t even want to try.
    I haven’t volunteered enough, or donated enough or any number of other not-enoughs that I could have done.
    It’s a struggle trying to raise children and who among us ever gets that just right? We all help our kids but when exactly does it cross the line to where helping becomes doing?
    When should we allow them to experience the reality their actions have consequences?     Or when should we save them from themselves? And how does marital strife ever become more important than the children born from that marital love?
    On the other end of our decision-making spectrum, would we like to re-think any of the decisions we’ve made about our parents? Did we take them for granted? Presume they owed us? Move out? Move in? Move away? Just to get away. Do we simply fail to call them as often as we should? Or as often as we hope our kids will someday call us?
    The thing about product recalls is that those companies don’t just remove products and regret decisions, but they re-start. They innovate with improved production processes and then – they get back out there. They fix it. “We admit, that one was a failure, please try this one. We’re better now.”
    We should be honest. They recall stuff to avoid lawsuits and save lives; but they sell what’s new so their business will last.
    Souls last through eternity. So it seems like something we should try as well. And it seems like Lent’s the perfect time.
    Dear God – Our today exists for a reason. Please help us see it and use it and share many more than that with you. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Valentine’s Day not about heartache’
By George Valadie
February 12, 2010
     Last week sometime, just to tease and torture her, I asked Nancy, “What would you say if I told you that I’ve already gotten your Valentine’s gift?”
    “You’d be lying,” she fired back. “But I’ve bought yours.”
She’s telling the truth – on both counts. I know she’s already gone shopping. This is her favorite holiday. But I’m no dummy. Me just mentioning the day drew a smile because she knows that most of the time I don’t even think about it much more than a few hours in advance.
    It’s hard being married to someone so romantic since I’m definitely not. Heck, I lived in fear of talking to girls until I was a senior in high school. And even then, I didn’t do it very well.
    “Romantic” is not how I was remembered in the yearbook of 1971.
    Our own daughters were over at the house last week when I told them I might write about Valentine’s Day. And they all chimed in together, “Dad, don’t be gooshy, you should write about all the miserable Valentines’ Days we had. Write about heartbreak and stuff because some people hate this day.”
    I must have struck a chord. Mostly, they’re afraid I might write about them. So this was quite enlightening. Heck, when they were teenagers, they never told me much at all, much less disclose their heartaches.
    I’m guessing most parents want their children to be happy. I was no different. But on Valentine’s Day, I was secretly happy when they weren’t. That would have meant boys and boyfriends. So I’ve been quite OK those few times they’ve had this particular void in their lives.
    Sarah said, up until fourth or fifth grade, she was just fine celebrating with those little heart-shaped candies and the really cool decorated box she took for collecting her classmates’ cards. Her mom and I had no worries then because we could count on other parents to make sure no one ever got left out.
    It must be somewhere after that when kids begin to feel the hurt.
    While our girls were recalling the guys who had broken their hearts, I couldn’t help but think back to the heartbreaks of my youth. Is it possible that all calamities of the heart can be divided into two distinct classifications? The people with whom we had a date — and the ones we only wished we had.
    There were several girls during my high school years who I really, really liked. The problem was I never asked any of them on a date, much less told them how I felt. I lived in fear of rejection.
    So I tried all the goofy “please-like-me” tactics that have never worked for anyone. I’d stare at her in class. I’d walk past her locker when she “happened” to be there. I’d park near her car, but not next to it.
    We’d walk to class together – sorta. I’d let her go in front of me in the lunch line. I’d tell her she played a good game. Most pathetic of all, I hoped my good grades would wow her.
    And when all of that failed (why was I surprised?) I’d turn my attention to another hoping she might like me like I liked her.
    One year, I steeled my nerves, drove some 20 miles to her home on a Sunday afternoon and knocked on her door unannounced. I can’t imagine what reason I gave her for being in her neighborhood, but I amazed myself when I asked her if she’d like to go with me to get the only thing I could afford – a Coke. She amazed me when she said yes.
    I had worked up the courage to invite her, but not quite the courage to tell her how I felt. So I drank as many refills as I could hold trying to stretch out my very lame visit until … well, until I don’t know what exactly. I had all the words formulated, but I couldn’t find the guts. Not then, not ever.
    And she broke my heart.
    I felt a different sort of pain when my first real girlfriend called it quits. At least I felt we were that close. I’ll never believe it wasn’t love, but I’ve long wondered if I was in love with love or with her.
    It seems to have been that same way with each of the females in my family, including my wife. There were guys they had hoped might be in their lives and there were those that actually were.
    Nancy added her own confession. There was a nice guy on whom she had a crush. But unlike me, they’d actually had a date or two. One evening after her wisdom teeth had been pulled, several of her friends dropped by to check on her but he couldn’t.
    But he did call later, and in teenager fashion, that convinced her they were destined to be together. Until they weren’t. And he liked someone else better.
    Her problem was complicated because her very best friend with whom she had shared her every secret was now “the other woman.” Ouch! It seemed to her as if she had lost two friends.
    Valentine’s Day is not about heartache. Though I guess we’ve all got one of those sorts of stories. But if we’re alive to read this (or write it), we survived what we thought we never could.
    And more importantly, the love we celebrate today would not have come to be — a heartache that would be much, much worse.
    Dear God – We sometimes forget that all our happy moments have been a gift from you. Thank you for each one. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Extraordinary caregivers at work in Haiti
By George Valadie
January 29, 2010
    “Hey, honey, have we got anything for a headache?”
    “Yeah, it’s in my purse.”
    Well, I’d rather do anything than go looking into that dark hole of whatever lives in there. But sometimes, you just have to.
    Among many other bottles of medicine I don’t think a man is supposed to be taking, I found one bottle of ibuprofen and one of aspirin.
    “Which of these am I supposed to take?”
    “Take the orange ones.” She likes to keep it simple for me.
    After she reminded me, I did recognize those little yellow aspirins. “Low-dose,” she calls them. Those are the same ones that she lays out on the counter for me each Monday thru     Friday workday while telling me these will help prevent a heart attack.
    I haven’t done any studies on how many hearts give out on the weekends, but I wonder about that every so often. And I know I’ve made her really mad when I see no pill lying there at all.
    My doctor wouldn’t be at all happy to know I never read the directions on these painkiller sorts of things – I just always pop four.
    But he won’t know, he’s gone to Haiti.
    I’ve never thought twice about the pills she buys or why she buys them until the horrid news about their earthquake hit.
    Until we came face to face with all those make-you-cry-like-a-baby stories relating one catastrophe after another.
    The orphans, the untold dead, the soon to die, the mass graves, the starving, the as yet un-found and the searchers who won’t give up. And that was before we learned how little they had before their island even ruptured.
    Take your pick. It’s all horrid. And it’s all news we Americans can hardly stomach without a stiff dose of Pepto.
    Of all the news I’ve heard and read, what disturbs me most are those accounts of the medical care that’s been delivered – sort of. The unthinkable surgeries, the unimaginable amputations, the sudden need to perform procedures that no medical school teaches.
    With the eight Port-au-Prince hospitals all pretty much decimated, temporary field hospitals were set up wherever they would fit.
    One arose in a couple’s front yard because the Haitians knew they were both doctors, a     new sort of “house call” I suppose. But most of these medical facilities arose — not from the ashes — but right in the middle of them.
    When my doctor says, “… this is gonna hurt a little bit, but you’ll feel much better after while, … ” I’m thinking this isn’t what he normally means.
    There are the doctors who were forced to buy their surgical saws at the street market – just a few booths down from the fruits and vegetables. And other ones borrowed pocket knives from a CNN crew.
    Vodka became a sterilizing agent. And when the patient’s belt snapped in half that had been serving as his tourniquet, they turned to the next best thing – a garden hose. Of course they did.
    One doc needed some surgical pins so he did what miracle workers do. He dismantled the carry-rack off a nearby bicycle, constructed an orthopedic splint, and screwed pieces of it into the patient’s bone. Primitive? Absolutely. Life-saving? Absolutely.
    You’d say it’s all inconceivable, except these magicians not only conceived it, they did it.
    When that one doctor said they were delivering a quality of care similar to what soldiers received back in our Civil War, I think he was trying to make it sound better than it is.
    Nancy’s had two hip-replacements requiring a similar sort of cutting. Both surgeries occurred in an operating room akin to a walk-in refrigerator while everyone there had to wear an outfit resembling a NASA space suit. No rusty old pocket knife, no dusty old field.
    And when it was over? I know they didn’t just give her a Motrin.
    I started thinking about all of that.
    I have a tree saw out in our garage. And we keep some bourbon in the kitchen cabinet. These are the tools they used to save a human life and the rest of the details just make me queasy.
    Since that’s all they had to offer, I googled exactly what my bottle of ibuprofen can do. It’s apparently recommended for headaches, muscle aches, back aches, dental pain, arthritis or athletic injuries. And it can even relieve aches and pains due to the common cold.
    But the list doesn’t include any sort of ache even closely resembling “arm cut off while still conscious,” even if you took the whole darn bottle and that other bottle of aspirin too.
    Once, I remember taking a day off when I had a “bad cold,” excessive sniffles I guess you’d call it. I’ve also been known to gripe about an hour in a waiting room. To get some non-life saving prescription that made me all better.
    I’ll never say another word.
    Dear God – We can’t all amputate, and we can’t all even go there. But help me remember them long after my $20 has been used. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Bless couple, not chaos’
By George Valadie
January 15, 2010
     And so the happiness begins! Oh boy! If that sounds a bit sarcastic, it is. I know the days ahead will be joyful, but I’m also pretty sure there will be moments (that seem like years) when we’ll all just have to pretend we see the bliss.
    Because Meg, our middle daughter, got engaged over the holidays. She was super excited — as were we. But if the next months are anything like the last few, this will be a crazy ride.
    The whole thing has been sort of surreal anyway because she accidentally saw the ring Jeremy had bought – quite some time ago. Well, not really the ring. They’d been driving along last summer and suddenly, for no reason, out of the blue, she opened his glove box.
    To discover a much smaller box.
    Let’s pause here to say books could be written about that alone. Why does a girlfriend go digging through a boyfriend’s car? Why does a boyfriend have a girlfriend’s engagement ring anywhere near where she might snoop? But that’s for another day.
    Like many couples in love, they had openly discussed their possible lives together. As well as weddings and honeymoons, kids and kids’ schools. They’ve even negotiated whether the Irish or the Hogs will get to be on their Saturday TV. The important things.
    But suddenly, all of their dreams resided inside a tiny velvet 2x2 square package that would now go into hiding.
    Shocked and staring, she cried, he laughed and they had no choice but to make an agreement. They would go on acting as if nothing happened. Yeah, right! Both said they would. Both lied.
    “Let’s pretend none of that just occurred,” he said, “where do you want to go for dinner?”
    “Oh, Wendy’s sounds good,” she played along, “and what have you been up to lately?”     I wish I’d heard the rest of that.
    Fast forward to this past weekend and the aforementioned joyfulness that’s been awaiting us. I found myself with Meg, her mother and her two sisters in two wedding dress stores. We were having fun while the boring old playoffs were on our hi-def TV back in the warmth of my living room.
    At our first stop, I was surprised to find one other father. Since we were kindred spirits,     I hoped we might strike up a conversation about the craziness of weddings.
    But there he was, stiff and erect, you would have thought the weather had frozen him there. He just sat fixed on a stool, staring.
    The man never gave up his vigil, he never smiled, he never seemed to be feeling the joy     I was having. He just gazed at the door of Dressing Room #6. No family member chatted with him. No one stepped out to ask his opinion. You could almost sense he would have been happy to see any girl come out of that room – even if it was someone else’s daughter. The more I observed him, the more I worried about him — and what awaited me.
    There were no dads at the next stop, which was scarier.
    Somehow, I’d escaped all of this when Katy got married, but here I was. To have been engaged barely a week, Meg seemed to have some very definitive ideas of what she wanted. It was almost as if she’d been thinking about this for quite some time?
    Some part of the dress, though I’m not sure which, had to be sweetheart. Some other part needed to be mermaid. There couldn’t have been many parts left but something needed to be vintage. I think.
    I’m an educated guy who was totally lost. Everyone in the room was nodding and smiling and seemed to understand what we were discussing. So I just nodded, too.
I exhibited one proud moment of coherence when I bragged that I knew what a train was.     Though utter confusion would have been better when I discovered she wanted two different lengths for hers – one for the church, one for the reception.
    No more nodding, I had to weigh in. Why would we pay for a sizeable amount of what appeared to be very nice fabric only to have it stuffed up under there somewhere later?     Not to mention paying for the hooks and nooks that must be attached to facilitate the stuffing-up-under-there?
    I was sent back to the nodding section of the store.
    All that being said, as a dad, I have to admit your breath is taken away when your own daughter finally does step out of Dressing Room #6. She was glowing, as were her mother, her sisters and the other customers nearby – though they may have just been excited to get their turn.
    It’s beautiful, it really is.
    And the best thing of all is that the store throws in free classes for how to put the darn thing on her. Seriously. There’s a class someone will need to attend to learn corset training. Thankfully, I’ve been excused from that.
    Before this is over, I hear Nancy and I will also be providing table cloths and tea lights, finger foods and flowers. But I’m hoping we’ve already given her the gifts she’ll really need. A sense of humor, a depth of love and some compromise for the conflicts that lie ahead.
    Oh, and some patience for when her own little girl gets married.
    Dear God – Please bless the couple, not the chaos. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Jesus hammered on people like me’
By George Valadie
December 18, 2009
     My Advent began without me actually knowing it.
    I know the season has an official beginning, but I can’t say that particular Sunday jump-started me into being a much better person, though that surely needs to happen.
    My personal Advent began on a Tuesday afternoon when I was running late for an off-campus meeting.
    Picture a right turn onto an Indy 500-type four-lane major highway. That’s not usually tough. But because of the left-hand turn that awaited me next, I needed to cross over the first three to get to the fourth. That’s not only tough, it’s usually impossible.
    But I caught a break – I saw what seemed like a manageable opening for a skilled driver such as myself. “Seemed like” are the key words here. I miscalculated my skill, the opening and how much space awaited me in that last lane if I safely navigated over the first three.
    No crash but there I was, the front half of my car in #4, my back half in #3, blocking both really. With beads of sweat on my forehead, the sort you get when you’re sure the world is staring at you, I turned to check who and how many I had inconvenienced.
    First in my backed-up line was a policeman. I couldn’t decide if he was glaring at my car, my driving or the cell on which I was talking. His lights began flashing; my sweat began pouring.
    I expected the worst but not what I got. He floored me when he said, “Sorry to pull you over, but your tag’s expired.”
    I’ll admit, this isn’t the first time. But not so much lately. So I feigned being a more responsible citizen than that. “OK, normally I would just give you a warning, but it expired in August. I don’t have much choice.”
    “August!” Now I really was stunned. “I can’t say a thing. What do you think it’s gonna cost me?”
    “Probably nothing, just show up with your tag and they’ll probably toss it out when you go to court. Have a good holiday.”
    Oh Lord. Court. The courthouse. The downtown city courthouse. The place where all the bad people have to go. Where I now had to go. And though security is everywhere, I haven’t met a soul who wants to go anywhere near the place for any reason.
    My appearance was set for 1:30 p.m. but I got there early in hopes of a quick in and out. Me and every other Memphis criminal. Imagine a line for free Super Bowl tickets; I was at the back of it.
    I had no idea how many courtrooms were in the place but turns out everyone in my line was headed into the same one, all scheduled for the exact same hour. With enough time to read the book I hadn’t thought I would need, I had plenty enough to take in my surroundings – and the people who were in it.
    Though I didn’t think it at the time, my arrogance had begun even before I had left home that day. I knew I’d be going to town and I knew the sort of people I’d likely encounter there, so, in spite of the biting cold, I chose to wear less than my best.
    Nancy had given me a really nice overcoat, I mean really nice. And I decided if I wore it, my appearance would suggest to the poor perhaps I could help them out with some pocket money. Though I try to be helpful, I just get really uncomfortable when approached by those I commonly think of as beggars.
    How embarrassing – and sinful — is that!
    I also had time to wonder what each of my fellow law-breakers had done. I guessed most of us had violated one traffic law or another. But there were so many others who passed us in the hallways – all headed to other courtrooms for other offenses.
    Proudly (which would be much better described as self-righteous), I just didn’t see myself as being as bad or as guilty as any of these people. Even those whose tags had expired just like mine. Embarrassing to admit, but I assumed what I assumed based solely on how they looked.
    I studied their clothes and their shoes, their coats and their haircuts. Some were ratty and rumpled, a good many were unkempt and unclean. The majority didn’t look as if they had the money to buy food, much less settle up for a traffic ticket.
    It was obvious times were tough for quite a few. And face-to-face with such need, I committed the most arrogant sin of all. Instead of reaching out to help, or even considering if I could, I spent most of my time in that line proudly convinced I wasn’t just better off … but that I was just better.
    Some Advent, huh?
    I can’t recall what inspired my revelation. Perhaps the Holy Spirit swooped in to slap me in the head – or the soul. But suddenly, while standing in that same line, I was overcome with a shameful embarrassment for the things I had been thinking.
    How did I get so self-important? When had I lost all sense of humility?
    Christ chose to be born into the meager home of a carpenter. He preferred to be a king without a castle. He embraced the poor and the downtrodden who walked among him. And more importantly, he came to walk among them.
    He hammered on the advantaged – not because they were – but because they understood nothing. Not what they had, not what mattered and certainly not from whom their blessings had come.
    He hammered on people like me.
    Is there any chance we can start this Advent over?
    Dear God – I’m a little late getting things ready – getting me ready. Please send your son anyway. Thank you. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘God, you are reason we do what we do’
By George Valadie
December 4, 2009
     I’m hoping your holidays prove to be everything you want them to be. Who doesn’t want our own moments to be as memorable as those in a Rockwell classic.
    Each year, we all plan so long and we work so hard to get ready. Sometimes they turn out just as we had dreamed and sometimes we make an incredible mess. Silly or sensible,     I suppose what matters is that we care enough to try.
    We had been looking forward to this Thanksgiving weekend. We were blessed enough to have our girls home and two of their three significant others. Since we’re all still speaking, this one turned out to be one of the better ones.
    Nancy has been so excited. She couldn’t wait to show off our new living room acquisitions. I say they’re “ours” because my name is on the checking account, but they’re really hers.
    Almost a year ago, she had received a gift certificate for a complimentary hour by a come-to-your-house home-decorator. Apparently, my wife had long been envisioning our transformed holiday home. While I had been thinking our stuff was just fine.
    Nancy said, “Oh, don’t worry, I just want her to make a few simple suggestions of how to move this trinket here and that doodad there. I’ve seen this on Oprah, these folks can make all the difference with items you already have.
    “Don’t worry. I just want to get the house looking good for the holidays. I get it, Christmas is coming and I know we don’t have any extra money.”
    Now — we have less. And Christmas is still coming. But I’ll admit, our trinkets and doodads do look better sitting on all the new furniture we weren’t going to buy.
    During one of our pre-holiday evening chats, Nancy talked about her day. “George, today I was getting a head start on the grocery shopping and can you believe it? They’re already out of whole-berry cranberry sauce.”
    I thought I was remarkably calm when I replied, “Honey, I don’t care how much you spend on the house, but you darn well better find some cranberry sauce.” A guy can only take so much.
    Turns out she’d been saving some secret project money for a while. When this discovery came to light, causing me to raise my eyebrows one too many times, she blurted out, “Don’t tell me you don’t have any secret money.”
    She was right but how did she know? Of course, it took me four months of clandestine hoarding to gather the $11 in quarters I thought had been hidden in my dashboard console. How did she save enough for new furniture.
    I woke up Thanksgiving morning in mid-drool from the aroma of a big old Butterball already in the oven while the ladies of the house had already been drooling over the Black Friday sales flyers in the morning paper.
    Nancy had actually begun her culinary efforts the day before when she tackled Mamaw’s version of turkey dressing. It apparently requires chopping, dicing and pre-cooking the stuff that makes the stuffing that she never really stuffs anywhere. But I don’t ask.
    As has become our own little Turkey Day tradition, I went ahead and made my annual suggestion that perhaps she didn’t really need to go to all that trouble.
    She fired back with a glare and her own annual comeback, “Well, if I had two ovens I wouldn’t have to start so darn early. We don’t have two ovens. Did you even know that?
    “We’re having potatoes and rolls and those green beans that everybody likes – you have to cook those in an oven too and we only have one. And I guess you’ll want me to heat up the dressing, I bet you won’t want it cold, will you?
    “And then there’s the cheesecake, you have to bake that too. We really need two ovens! Any other comments?”
    I had one forming in my head (“Hey, Betty Crocker, don’t two ovens seem a bit much for one day a year?”) but I decided to keep it right where it was. No sense bleeding on a holiday.
    The other Valadie holiday tradition – shopping with the crazies — commenced the next morning. Two daughters had to work but Meg and my wife planned, mapped and strategized though neither had pressing need of anything in particular.
    Still, they joined the insane and headed out at what reasonable folks would consider an unreasonable hour.
    Meg came and went from our house on four different occasions that day – each to tackle another set of stores. And with each drop-in to drop-off she proclaimed, “You’d be proud of me, Dad, I can’t tell you how much money I’m saving.”
    First, she had saved $100, which later became $400, which swelled to $700 on the third trip which became all the proof I needed that she is her mother’s child.
    There they were, each getting ready for the holidays, each making the effort, each wanting someone else’s days to be special. Both in need of therapy.
    I asked her only two questions, “Meg, how much money did you have to spend to save all of that?” and “Did you happen to buy your mother a stove with two ovens?”
    Dear God – You are the reason why we do what we do. We are the reason why we usually forget. Please forgive the dumb part. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Make list of things, people you’re thankful for
By George Valadie
November 20, 2009
     Education is the only career I’ve ever had. My primary role began as classroom teacher, with an opportunity to coach on the side and a dab of some extracurricular activities thrown in for fun.
    And believe me, every day of it was fun.
    As times and roles have changed, so has the size and location of the pulpit from which I get to preach. And what teacher doesn’t also preach.
    Our students now have been kind enough to invite me to write a little sliver of text for their student newspaper. But at this time of year, they can almost predict what I’ll say. I know they can because they tell me they can.
    As corny as it may sound to them – and my family — with Thanksgiving on the horizon, I actually do think all of us should take some time to make that list of things and people for which we can be thankful.
    We all love to eat the food and celebrate the day; we should at least have a reason. And how much time can it take really?
    There – that was it. That’s what I’ve been encouraging students and teachers to do – year after year. And I imagine a few have even given it a try. But if I’m being honest, I have to tell you, I never have. Not even once.
    I’m confessing a bit but I’ve never actually taken the time to write out a pen-on-paper sort of list for which I have long preached the need. If you want a classic example of hypocrisy, you’ll never find one better than me.
    Needless to say, it’s way past time. Of course, mine won’t look anything like theirs or yours if you get to make one. I don’t have nearly enough space and some are just way too personal. But I have been blessed and I never mind telling people. Maybe some of mine     might look like some of yours.
    Dear God – Thank you. I’m 56 years old, reasonably healthy and absolutely tickled to be on the high side of the grass. I know so many who should be a lot younger than I who are not.
    Dear God – Thank you. How great is it that we get to donate food to the food bank rather than ask for it.
    Dear God – Thank you. I keep a secret list of friends who – no matter where they are and no matter what they are doing – they will come if I need them. I’d trust them with my life, not to mention my secrets.
    Dear God – Thank you. I’d be more thankful if, because of how I’ve lived my life, I knew I had earned a spot on their list too.
    Dear God – Thank you. My mom found a way to send me to good schools and then … she made sure I did my part. I don’t know that these would have been on my list way back when – but they sure are now – both parts.
    Dear God – Thank you. I’ve never had to know what it is to fear a bomb or face a gun.
    Dear God – Thank you. Our family – both near and not so near — gets to gather together fairly often. Not everyone’s does — nor do they even want to. Our holidays usually see us eating, teasing and laughing around the same table. It’s always chaos, and always fun.
    Dear God – Thank you. Not only is my mother still around, but she’s happy and healthy and knows me when she sees me. I never used to think about that last part all that much.
    Dear God – Thank you. Some search for years and some never get so lucky, but I found the love of my life a long, long time ago.
    Dear God – Thank you. I not only found a wife that loves me but in-laws who did the same. When all I could provide their daughter was a car that wouldn’t go in reverse, they never said a word. When the two of us travelled with a quarter in our collective pockets (before debit cards), they never said a word. When our kids ate candy corn as a vegetable, they never said a word. We miss them both.
    Dear God – Thank you. I’ve never had lots of money, but I’ve always had a job at which to earn some. Forgive me for the times I thought that was all due to me.
    Dear God – Thank you. When we were growing up, I thought Mom let us get dressed in front of our open oven door because it was fun. I thought she was mixing french fries with scrambled eggs to be silly. I thought broiling American cheese in a split hot dog was high-on-the-hog eating. I thought we had what all the other kids had. How did she do that?
    Dear God – Thank you. Each of our girls has a guy in their lives that we think the world of. If you know much about our kids, then you’ll understand when I tell you that each of those young men has at times leapfrogged our own to have a turn as our favorite child.
    Dear God – Thank you. We can afford to care for two crazy dogs who like to eat their stuff (from the treat bag), our stuff (from the pantry) and stuff nobody wants (bricks from the yard).
    Once I sat down, set aside the time and actually got started, this list and much more just poured out of me. And I realized the obvious.
Why would we do this just once a year?
    Dear God – Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And not just today! Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Who wins in food drive competition?
By George Valadie
November 6, 2009
     Since my entire professional career has been spent with teenagers, there’s not a whole lot they can do that surprises me anymore. So why would I be shocked when I encountered a few of our students in the hallway dressed like cows. I kid you not.
    For humans, they were pretty good looking cows too. Then around the corner came a few student “farmers” to join them. This group had pieced together, very proudly I might add, a quite respectable farm for kids who have likely never seen one.
    Turns out they were heading to a pep rally – though I never quite understood the theme – that was being sponsored by the area food bank to kick off their annual fall collection drive.
    Several years ago, that organization decided to reach out to our city’s many public and private high school students in an effort to hopefully stir their competitive juices.
Intrinsically, most students know there’s a value in and a need for donating to the poor.     They’ve always been good for a few cans of beets or asparagus. They hate to eat those anyway.
    (Years ago I can still recall donating my mom’s cans of hominy. Didn’t know what it was (still don’t) or why we had it (still don’t) but I was sure others would enjoy it more than I.)
    But extrinsically, it doesn’t take much. We’ve learned if you throw in a six-inch trophy and some potential bragging rights most kids will clean out their pantry if mom’s not watching.
    I’m OK with that. But some are not.
In my first year of teaching at my old Catholic high school, we had a holiday food drive too.     As it kicked off, I learned that all donations were to be collected in each homeroom and I had been assigned one.
    I was OK with that until I discovered the whole thing was to culminate in a school-wide assembly at which each homeroom would process in, one at a time, and “deliver” its basket – or baskets – depositing them on the gym floor for all to see.
    To add to the fun, each homeroom was allowed to dress up its basket and its presenters depicting any theme from the holiday.
    This is when I began to sweat. My immediate concern was that all my kids were just freshmen and their concern was that they were being led by the new guy. They could see it my eyes.
    Honestly, we had never covered food-basket-decorating or dressing-up-your-high-school-students-for-thematic-holiday-parades or anything like that during my teacher education courses. I never even liked dressing up for Halloween. I was petrified.
    But the only thing that scared me more was that absolute fear of being humiliated in front of my peers and the student body. These were now my kids. What if we didn’t bring in as much as others? What if our baskets looked stupid? What if everyone laughed?
    I couldn’t leave this up to just me. I needed advice so I sought out my more veteran peers to see what they were doing. How serious were they about all of this anyway?
    And that’s when I discovered a huge gap in educational theory. It was true then, it remains true today.
    Some teachers were offering “bonus points” on a quiz or a test to inspire their students’ generosity. Some were dealing in “homework passes,” not just for their homeroom students, but for all their students.
    You get the idea, some of the faculty were in to “Sure, you have a duty to your own homeroom, be sure to bring them a few cans, but your grade in history comes from me.”
    Not only were their baskets going to be loaded, but they were going to be impressive.     Some had plans for sleighs with elves and reindeer, while others were opting for the three kings bearing gifts. This was getting serious.
    But then I also found a much different sort of advice. There were other members of the staff who vehemently opposed such bribery. They would be offering no points and no motivation. The idea offended them. If their students weren’t inspired to give for the right reasons then shame on them.
    It was up to me to choose.
    I thought about it, I really did. Both had their very valid points. What are we saying to these kids? What lessons are we teaching? What will stick? What will be forgotten by week’s end?
    I took it all in — and I chose the hungry people.
    Short of giving away the farm, I offered bonus points. I bribed, cajoled, preached and even resorted to some good old-fashioned guilt. We decorated a tree and decked out our baskets. We even had a little fun in the process. We traded in some good history time for the much less valuable nonsense time.
    Nonsense, I suppose, unless you were a family who received one of those baskets.
    I couldn’t tell you – even today – if I chose correctly. I don’t know what, if anything, stuck with those kids. But I can tell you that debate still rages on some 30+ years later. Those same arguments will be repeated up and down our halls next week.
    And sadly, there’s also a new generation of people who are just as hungry.
    The needy don’t go away, do they? We’ll encounter all of them soon. Drives for food, new toys, used toys, clothing, warm-coats, pet food. Add one dollar to your grocery bill, two to your power bill. Come ring a bell, serve some soup, wrap a package.
    They may not know why we do those things, but our kids never fail to notice that we do. Consider that a seed well planted.
Dear God – “I meant to.” Please help us not leave it at that. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Humans give technology its shape
By George Valadie
October 23, 2009
     It seems somewhat trite to even mention this – but have you noticed how much and how quickly our lives are changing?
    Seldom does a day go by when you can’t read about, hear about or actually experience some unbelievable innovation that’s no longer unbelievable. And if it hasn’t happened yet, they tell you it will be here soon.
    Nancy makes fun of me when I return from the grocery store having been astonished by some new product that I didn’t know you could buy. “Seriously George, they’ve been selling that for 10 years. If you went every so often, you’d know that.” Oops.
    True, so much has been around for more than a few years. But when you take a breath and take it all in, life truly is amazing.
    My daughter can get a college degree and seldom step foot on the campus that confers it.
    I’ve written this column for over 10 years and have yet to pick up pen, pencil or paper to “write.”
    I haven’t actually seen my paycheck since I don’t know when. There were some years when Nancy took it and then they just quit issuing one altogether.
    I don’t carry cash anymore either. I used to blame that on Nancy too but who really needs it? Our church is even open to automatic bank drafts.
    Experts say it won’t be long before all our credit cards are condensed into but one. And when that happens, will embedding the chip under my skin be far behind? And what exactly is a chip?
    My entire health history is on a disk in my wallet in case – well, just in case.
    We don’t have one yet but they say toilets exist that can not only dispose of your waste, but analyze it first and then transmit the results to your doctor. Which I suppose will end up on my disk.
    Is there anything your phone cannot do? I read about a college band somewhere in which all of the musicians play nothing but their phones.
    Doesn’t it seem odd that we can gain and lose friends but never meet them?
    There was a day when satellites used to do something – though we didn’t know what — for NASA. Now they talk to my car radio.
    Doesn’t it seem as if something just as complex should be required to control my heat and air, my lights and television – at least something more advanced than the clap of my hands.
    My cable, DVR, pause-live-action, two-pictures-in-one, high-definition, unnecessarily large television has 999 slots for channels and most are already filled.
    Not five minutes ago I saw an advertisement on it for a key-punch front door lock that – once opened — will send an immediate text to a parent who needs to know Joey’s home.
    Crock pots cook, dishwashers wash, ovens clean and vacuums vacuum – all without you. Cars can locate how to get you where you’re going, park you, see behind, beside and in front of you – you don’t really need you.
    Here are some futuristic sounding ideas coming our way.
     Infra-red scanners that can be placed at the entrance to a business or school that can identify anyone who enters carrying a higher-than-normal fever.
     Shoes that think and are able to adjust how much or how little support to provide the wearer.
     Plants that can play music if placed in the right type of vase.
     Medication that can be delivered to the patient by sound waves that part the cells of your skin.
    They would all sound futuristic except for the fact that each was invented some five years ago. In fact, every single thing I’ve mentioned came to life in the space of my lifetime.
    Life is definitely different, but is it better?
    We still have wars. We still have hunger and pain and suffering. I suppose it comes down to how we choose to use these advancements and all they have given us.
    Facebook and MySpace, Twitter and e-mail, you name it. Each gives us the opportunity to reach out to so many more people. Are we really reaching out or are we just bringing them in? To come hear all about … me.
    I love TiVo. We seldom watch any of our favorite shows at their actual times. We prefer to watch them later so we can skip through all the commercials. Saving hours of our time.     But have we done anything worthwhile with all of it? Any of it? I’d be embarrassed to tell you.
    My daughter can know the gender of her child to be. We couldn’t. Her co-worker might have said it best. “Katy, don’t do it, don’t do it!” he pleaded, “There are so few true surprises left in the world. I promise I’ll come paint the baby’s room myself the day it’s born. Just let this happen.”
    Katy? Not a chance. Will she be wrong to find out? Or just wrong to overly obsess about the room and the paint and the endless decorations that her baby will never comprehend.
    Think back to all that someone else has invented. Now think ahead to all that we can do as a result.
    To borrow someone else’s phrase, What Would Jesus Do – with all this stuff. Yes, life is and can indeed be better.
    Dear God — Technology isn’t good or bad. Humans give it its shape. Please bless the shapers. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Grumpaw’ trying to figure out how he feels
By George Valadie
October 2, 2009
    I just can’t believe it. We’re expecting. A baby.
    No, no, no … I don’t mean Nancy and me. That’s the sort of news that would land us on CNN.
    No, I was talking about our family. It’s actually Katy, our oldest, and her husband Clint who are pregnant. Well, technically, Clint’s not pregnant. Just Katy. And this will be our first grandchild.
    We’re all excited for them but Nancy, her mother, is super-so. We’ve been talking about them having grandchildren since they got married four years ago. And as much as my wife tried, she had to finally admit this was one of those things she just couldn’t control.
    And that’s hard for Nancy. So this is great fun for her.
    I think it’s great too, I really do. I’m excited because they’re excited. But I have to admit, it’s a very strange feeling.
    I’ve been trying to figure out what it is that I feel and I think I’ve finally hit on it.
    I’m not aging all that gracefully. Don’t want to really. I’m 56-years-old but on any given day, most every day actually, I see myself as 30. And that is just way too young to be called Grandpa. Or Gramps. Or Pops. Or what my girls tell me it will most likely be – Grumpaw.
    Along with my strangely distorted view of me, seldom am I able to tell anyone the actual ages of our girls either. Sarah, our youngest, turned 23 this summer and I was just sure we were celebrating her 19th.
    In my world, I try to keep each of them frozen at just a year or so out of college. Not too young to be a mother, but way too young for any daughter of mine.
    I can still remember so vividly when Katy came home with us from the hospital to our one bedroom apartment. There she lay in her little crib a good six inches from our bed where we heard each little gurgle and every little squeak. And neither of us knew what any of them meant. Though we were pretty sure that they meant something that any good parent could interpret.
    When she was but one month old, trying desperately to get her to quit crying, I vividly recall giving her a late-night walking tour of our brand new larger two-bedroom apartment.     The one where we had moved so we wouldn’t hear the crying that I now found myself trying to pacify.
    “This is your new room,” I cooed, “we want you to be sure to keep it clean. (Never happened.)
    “This is your new dresser. Lots of nice people gave you all of these pretty little clothes. For free. See if you can wear them the rest of your life. (Never happened.)
    “This is our bathroom. I know you’re new to the whole idea of sharing, but I’ll need to get in here sometimes. (Never happened.)
    “And this is our clothes hamper. Here’s a little tip, don’t put anything in there that you actually need to get back anytime soon. I’m not sure where they go.” She apparently took my advice because she never put anything in it. Ever.
    And now that same little infant will have one of her own.
    Just this week, I had an opportunity to travel back to our hometown and enjoy a mini-reunion with the five guys with whom I had spent so many of my high school weekends.
    Back then we were blessed to get to hang out at a hunting cabin that belonged to one of the guy’s parents. Odd really, as I think back, because I never owned a gun, never shot an arrow, never spent one minute hunting in my entire life. But they invited me to hang out and it was a great place for us to be teenage boys.
    And that’s where we re-unioned, way down on the banks of the Tennessee River, and the crazy crooked drive to get there that took me back through time.
    Time does indeed march on. One of them remains my best friend today. But the rest had fallen through the cracks of my life. It had been almost 35 years since we had last gathered there.
    But there we all were. The traditional shaking of hands that melted into big bear hugs that never would have happened so many years ago. Some wrinkles here, some extra pounds there, gray hair everywhere and not a 30-year-old in the room. None of them had stayed that way and certainly not me.
    As is true at most re-unions, we summarized the missing years in the first hour, re-told tales and lies in the second and spent all the rest talking about our kids. And their kids.     Turns out I wasn’t the only gramps in the group.
    It was a blast.
    And now, don’t ask me why, I’m as excited as Nancy is. I think it’s because we’re going to have a grandchild and I realized I’m just 56.
    Just 56. With plenty of years to watch them cry and grow out of their clothes and hog their mother’s shower.
    Grumpaw is super excited.
Dear God – Each new life is a blessing and a gift. Please help those who can’t see it, don’t want it or treat it as anything but. Please cure their blindness. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Mark’s words still confound us to this day’
By George Valadie
September 25, 2009
     Have you ever had a “miracle” happen for you?
    Whether we use the literal term or the figurative term, has it ever happened to you? Or someone you love?
    Perhaps it may have been one of those real sent-from-heaven, never-be-the-same-again sorts of events you just know could only be the handiwork of God — a medical recovery from the edge of the afterlife or survival of a car wreck from which no one ever should.
    Or perhaps it wasn’t nearly that soul-shaking. Maybe it just seemed that way — family members making peace after too many years at war. Or coming upon a little extra $$$ when both the food and money cupboards were bare. Or even better, finally finding that job to provide the cash to fill the cupboards.
    Now think back, when this particular good fortune came your way, whom did you tell?     How many did you tell? How quickly did you get the news out? How many methods did you use? That’s exactly why good news travels fast.
    So how is it that Christ expected anything more from the people of his day.
    “Yes, I know, you’ve been deaf and mute your entire life and I realize I just fixed all that, but be sure not to tell anyone you know.” (I’ve always wanted to read that excerpt when the guy replies, “You know they’ll probably ask, so what do I tell them?”)
    Or there are those other passages when he says to the Apostles, “I know y’all saw me heal that guy’s leprosy but don’t spread it around.”
    The last several weeks of Gospels tell of Jesus going out of his way to make that odd and seemingly contradictory request.
    “Give up all you have and come follow me so we can change the world. But let’s do this thing quietly.”
    With that frame of mind, it doesn’t seem like the message would have travelled all that far. But I have noticed he did say it quite a bit; I’ve just never really understood why.
    Scripture scholars through the centuries have weighed in on the topic again and again. But none of them actually said those words nor did any of them write them. So their interpretation of the Gospel is indeed just that. A guess. A pretty educated guess. A far better guess than one I might give. But a guess all the same.
    Mark is the gospel author who most commonly references these clandestine-sorts of comments of Christ. Some have called this the “Messianic secret.”
    In an effort to understand his words, many believe it was the Lord’s attempt to help the people “get it.” Yes, he was here to save humanity, yes he was the Messiah, but not the sort of savior for whom they had been hoping, waiting and praying. Focusing on these miracles just clouds the issue.
    There’s that view for sure. But it’s just one of many.
    The words of Mark still confound us to this day. Especially what with all the other miracles that Christ performed but didn’t ask anyone to hide.
    I asked my mom what she thought.
“If your best friend asks you to keep a secret,” she said, “wouldn’t you do it? I would never, ever tell what my friends asked me. I can’t believe any of them did.”
    Someone else weighed in on the same question, “If this man had the miraculous powers he had, and you didn’t really know him all that well, wouldn’t you be a little intimidated thinking he might un-do what he just did. I’d have kept quiet for sure.”
    Well, we’ve all got our theories why he asked. I have some really goofy ones at times.     So here’s another. If the people of 30 A.D. were anything like those who live here 2000 years later, then they weren’t all that good at keeping secrets either. In fact, the more you need people to guard what’s important, the more likely it will get out — not by everyone, but more than a few.
    So, here’s my way-out-there theory. Do you think Jesus might have actually been counting on the failures and frailties of the men with whom he surrounded himself?
    Surely he knew they would tell. Heck, he even knew they would betray and deny him. He just had to have known they would never be able to keep these sorts of secrets to themselves.
    Did he tell them knowing they couldn’t? Did he emphasize the need to keep things low-key because that generally insures the word will get out? Make any secret a bigger deal and that virtually insures the world will know.
    When your mission is to change the entire world – without the benefit of mass media, or any sort of media for that matter – you’d need lots of voices spreading the good news.
    Right or wrong – had I seen and heard the incredible man they got to see and hear, I’d have blabbed it to everyone I ever knew.
    Why aren’t we quite so eager to do that now?
Dear God – You sent your Son for all of us even the ones who never got to meet him. Thank you for all those who have helped us learn about him. Please help us take our turn. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`Every year we revisit crisis plans’
By George Valadie
September 4, 2009
    When will heaven get its own crisis plan?
    With the start of school comes our staff’s annual revisiting of the crisis plans. Honestly, you couldn’t remember all of them if you had to.
    In today’s world where parents trust us with their most prized possessions, we pray for the best but prepare for the worst. Should the bad stuff come, I’m hoping knowing what to do will make the worst a little less so.
    This year, we’ve had to add another topic to the list. We’re getting ready for the swine flu.
    I’ve read emails, memos and press releases from government and church officials not to mention just about anything I can get my hands on from media outlets. I don’t know nearly enough but I do know more than I wish I did.
    Prior to this, we watched a film on blood-borne pathogens and how to survive them whether they result from a cut finger or a caved-in wall. It includes an exposure control plan to help our teachers jump into a mess, possibly save a life and still avoid hepatitis. Elsewhere, we have defibrillators, emergency bags and instructions for handling seizures.
    And we have drills, lots of drills. We discussed what to do during fire alarms that happen in the middle of a normal class on a normal day as well as one that might happen while we’re eating at lunch, celebrating at liturgy, or screaming at a pep rally.
    We have drills for tornados and earthquakes and the worst fear of all – at least for me – the lockdown procedures that we’ll rehearse for when some gun crazed intruder decides we’re the school in which they’ve chosen to make history.
    This year, we’ve now added the discussion of H1N1.
    I was dissecting my 40-page briefing memo from the CDC (Center for Disease Control) just before the media announced the worst-case scenario. It seems well-respected someones are suggesting the infected numbers might reach as high as 50 percent of U.S. population.
    If the “infected” number reaches that high, the “affected” number will be everyone else.
Since we have over a thousand walking our halls every day, with virtually all of them in the defined “most likely” age range, the math’s not hard to do. Half would still be a lot of sick folks.
    We are reminding them to wash their hands, but heck, we’re dealing with teenagers. I didn’t coin the phrase but a good many teenagers suffer from what is sadly and tragically known as “terminal uniqueness” – that common but deadly belief that “it will never happen to me.”
    We’re always looking for ways to reach into the teenage brain. I read a school nurse in New York is telling students, “If it’s wet … and it isn’t yours, don’t touch it.” We haven’t put it on a poster yet. But gross can get it done sometimes.
    We’ve armed the teachers and classrooms with hand disinfectant that is at least 60 percent alcohol.
    This year the emphasis seems to be on trying to keep schools open rather than closing them for the random cases that do appear. Still, should we be victims of the widespread, our doors will close as others have done. And we’ll teach via the internet.
    When I discussed the long-term shut-down possibility with our cleaning company I was relieved to know they are in fact well prepared. Should we be forced to close, I had been envisioning spending that week or two in my office – keeping tabs and catching up on the files that need some uninterrupted time. But not now.
    The cleaners told me they’d be coming in space suits to do what they will do. Rather than monitor them, I’ll just trust them. But protective space suits suggest a place I’d rather not be. And it turns out my file folders are all portable.
    Every bit of it – the soap and the scenarios and the space suits – it’s mostly a reaction for when a crisis hits us smack in the nose. Helping the horrible seem bad and the bad seem not so much.
    I was thinking about my own life and how I want it to end. And where. Not so surprisingly, I must come to terms with the fact that – in and around my own heart and soul — I’m woefully lacking in disaster plans. And there are surely times when it’s been a disaster in there.
    Sadly, I must admit I don’t have any such drills or contingencies in mind for when I am my own disaster. For when I’ve blown up my own soul with sin and selfishness. For when     I’ve given in to temptation. When I’ve fallen down, let someone down or worse, when I’ve let them go.
    I don’t think I’ve been planning thoroughly enough. What with my “If I’m a disaster on Monday, I’ll hope to do better on Tuesday” idea. Seriously, that’s all I’ve got.
    How about you? When will heaven get its own crisis plan?
Dear God – Please protect all those who have and will suffer from that for which we’re just not ready. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Today we buried a really good man’
By George Valadie
August 7, 2009
     We said good-bye to a really good man today.
    It was one of those final good-byes. And even though he was 80 and everyone knew his cancer was winning, it was still that kind of sad good-bye in an eerily quiet cemetery where you can almost hear the tears running down their cheeks.
    But it was also the kind of farewell that was tenderly punctuated with treasured stories of love and laughter remembered by a family who will never forget.
    I might be wrong but I don’t think he’ll never be famous. Nor are you likely to ever read about him. He probably wouldn’t have liked that anyway.
    Nancy and I aren’t in his family – except by marriage, though it would have been an honor to have been so. He was our son-in-law’s grandfather with whom we were lucky enough to get to share a few meals over the last few years. That was pretty much all I knew of him really.
    We all know folks you meet whose personality leaps out at you. That was John. He could tell a great story, he could tell a better joke. He was comfortable teasing folks he had just met – that would be us. And God gave him that rare twinkle that made you actually enjoy it more than he did.
    We are Catholic, he definitely was not. His deeply engrained faith caused him to question how difficult it was going to be for our family to even get to heaven.
    But what I admired most about him was that he actually cared about whether or not we would.
    Those few meals are about all the time we needed to tell he was a good man.
    Turned out he was a really good man.
    That’s what we came to appreciate when we were privileged to sit in and among Papa’s family as they recounted the life he had led and the lessons he had taught them.
    There was a memorial at his church where he had volunteered to be a greeter. In the Catholic churches we have known, we’ve been more accustomed to the concept of ushers who help us find seats.
    And I’m OK with that.
    We don’t really seem to have greeters as such, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. But if they do what I think they do, his church should have hired him full-time.
    Can’t imagine they had anyone better.
    I much prefer the theology of our funeral Mass. But truthfully, I’m not yet comfortable with the evolving tradition our church is embracing that allows family and friends to add some final and personal “remarks” before the liturgy ends.
    In fact, Nancy is under strict orders to make sure that no one speaks at my funeral but the celebrant priest (though I’m not entirely sure how I’ll enforce that).
    But in this case, and because it was a memorial celebration more than a funeral service,     I walked out as the one enriched by the wealth of their memories.
    Papa’s son recalled for us having been a young boy of about 10, riding along with his father. Stopped at a traffic light, both father and son noticed the blind gentleman standing at the corner, waiting to cross.
    Without hesitation, he told his young son to get out and help the man cross the street.     Are you kidding me? What 10-year-old anywhere is up for all of that?
    A kid’s natural fear of a handicap? And walking right up to a stranger? Your dad staying in the car? Speaking to the man? Grabbing his elbow? Or maybe worse, him grabbing yours?
    Think about that in today’s world. It’s just not happening.
    Over the years Papa may have forgotten all about it. That’s what dads do. But never did the son who was forever changed for the better.
    A few years later, Papa and Meemaw, who back then were just mom and dad, decided to share their family Sundays with a teenage kid whom they invited to join their family of five.
    Born into a family that could have invented the term “dysfunctional,” this kid had virtually nothing — not materially, not emotionally and certainly not spiritually. So Papa decided they would step up, pick him up, take him to church, and then back to their home for what was most likely his solitary bath and most surely his finest meal of the week.
    He got some of their food, more than a few of their clothes, and a huge chunk of Papa’s Sunday afternoon time.
    “Really? Who is this guy? And why does he get what’s ours?” I don’t know about their family, that’s just where my heart would have been. Fully understanding that he doesn’t have, but struggling to understand why we should give him some of ours.
    Today, they lovingly treasure every ounce of those life lessons that might have weighed so heavy at the time.
    Tell me the last time we put faith into action like that. I never have. I sat there listening to his life and realized even now he was still teaching – only the student was me. He was teaching his lessons from a grave in the ground, from his seat in the heavens.
    Honestly, I like to think of myself as a good man. But today, we buried a really good man.
    Dear God – Your gift is always life. Ours is what we do with it. Help mine be as good as his. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘God does indeed take care of children, fools’
By George Valadie
July 10, 2009
By George Valadie
    Sarah turns 23 tomorrow.
    I can hardly believe it. Doesn’t seem possible that she has gotten so old so soon.
    I still feel too young for our youngest to be that age, though that’s a matter of perspective I suppose. She reminds me often that my upcoming 56th birthday is closer to 60 than it is to 50. She’s still a joy.
    Some dozen years ago when I began writing this column, she was in elementary school just learning that nouns have case and verbs have tense. Back then she was shaping sentences; now she writes a blog.
    If there’s a writer in the family, it’s Sarah. I may have written much more, but she writes much better.
    I’d like to tell you she’s exactly where we thought she would be at this stage of her life, but nothing could be farther from the truth. It’s not at all where she had planned to be either.
    Sarah’s college route has been circuitous at best – disastrous at its worst. Some of that — not all – but some was our fault too.
    In spite of an anxiety we discovered which led to a few academic disasters, we pushed and cajoled and encouraged her to stay with it because we thought that’s what parents were supposed to do. She went along because she thought that’s what our daughters were supposed to do.
    If I were to be soul-baring honest, I’d probably have to admit that we wanted her to finish school like all the other kids would be doing partly because we wanted our family to be thought of as just as normal as all the rest.
How’s that for insane parenting!
    If you ask her, I think she’ll be the first to tell you that she’s piled up more than a few questionable decisions in her 23 years in school and out. And the results have been predictable – all have been difficult, some have been deserved.
We all laugh – though sometimes it’s not so funny – that her tombstone will simply say, “But I meant to!”
    She meant to do her homework and she meant to mail that payment. She meant to pick up that towel and she meant to renew her license.
    One morning, she found herself in her car on the way to work when she looked in the rearview mirror and noticed the wet towel still wrapped around her head. I want to believe she had meant to dry it.
    All that being said, still, we’re really proud of her.
    Not for the mistakes, but for the growth.
    She holds a full-time job in a bank, has slowly but surely knocked out a few more nighttime college hours and has come to the conclusion – on her own this time – that she wants to return to school on a full-time basis.
    Both of us being in education, we’re thrilled about the degree thing. But I’m learning it’s not all about that.
    Katy, the oldest, was different. Aren’t they all? She criss-crossed several divergent paths on her way through school – choosing some all at once. But her largest sin was of a different sort.
    We discovered – or should I say she finally admitted – that she had buried herself in financial misery. First it was hers, then it became ours.
    In another salute to parenting wizardry, we somehow let her get away to school without any solid understanding of money, credit or financial responsibility.
    Today, years later, she works at a bank and has the credentials to plan your financial life. And believe it or not, we’re letting her plan ours. She’s pretty good at it, too.
    I know she’ll do well for us. We face our retirement future with not much; she fears she’ll face it with us on her door step.
    Meg, the middle Valadie child, just turned 29 last month. She lived her high school and college life on the outer edge. It’s not like she was a terrible kid but she definitely knew how to take advantage of having dad as your principal.
    She found a way to roam the halls and irritate her teachers. Once, we left her home during an out-of-town trip (yet one more tribute to our parenting genius) so she promptly threw a party that concluded with the police descending on our cul-de-sac.
    Today, she finds herself with an office full of her own employees. And she’s learning to insist they tow the line. I love it, I know her old teachers would.
    Please don’t read this as any sort of ego-filled boasting about the wonderful Valadie children. It’s anything but.
    Yes, we’re proud of our kids – just as you are proud of yours — but this has nothing to do with accomplishments. It’s more about the journey – the one that all of our kids must travel.
    I once worked for a great man who said, “You can never give up on your kids.” It’s not like it was Shakespeare quotable or anything, but we’ve never forgotten it.
    They don’t all travel the path we would want and it never seems to happen in the timeframe we would hope, but God does indeed take care of children and fools. Enjoy the ride.
Dear God – Thank you for the gift of parenthood. Please give us patience for the trip and keep us mindful of the wonder. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Someone out there please pray for me’
By George Valadie
June 12 , 2009
By George Valadie
    Well, she surprised me a week or so ago.
    That doesn’t happen much after 32 years. But there it was, sitting on the kitchen table.     I came home to find she had written a letter. A real letter. I knew immediately it was hers because of the handwriting. After 32 years, that doesn’t change much either.
    No one writes letters anymore. I receive them all the time, but what I mean is that seldom does anyone ‘hand write’ a letter. I know I don’t. I get lengthy e-mails, word-processed prose, texts and tweets. But nothing from an old-fashioned Bic pen.
    I do write notes of congratulations, brief lines of thanks and an occasional paragraph of sympathy. Not enough and never on time, but I do write them. Still, I never take the time to write a real letter. Not anymore.
    And as best I can tell, Nancy doesn’t either. At least not that I’ve seen.
    I thought for just a moment that perhaps she had written it to me. Was she that irritated? Surely not. I couldn’t think of anything I had done. (Though it says something about me that I would assume the negative before the positive.)
    On the other hand maybe I had done something that had inspired her to take pen in hand and express her undying love for me? But sadly, I couldn’t think of anything there either.
    I approached with trepidation and got close enough to see it said “Dear somebody” and the somebody wasn’t me. It wasn’t mine to read but what can I tell you — she wasn’t at home. So I sat down to eaves-read.
    “Dear Nikki – Thank you for coming to stay with our dogs. I have a few things I want to tell you ….” Really? A few things that go on for two full pages on a legal pad? I had to read more.
    She told her where the food is (though she’s been at our house before), which dog gets which dish (as if they don’t know) and what time they normally eat (though they’ve never seemed at all unable to communicate their hunger to us.)
    OK, I buy the need for all that. But still she continued.
    “They love their treats. It’s OK to give them the regular ones whenever they’re acting crazy, driving you crazy or if you just want to win their love. They get so excited about those cute little heart-shaped crunchy treats but not so much the little round ones. Please give them their peanut butter treats at nine o’clock sharp, that’s what they’re used to – oh yeah, for this, they really like the creamy kind much better.
    “Maggie likes to lay on the ottoman in the evening, Charlie likes to lay on Maggie.
    “Their bedtime is about 10:30 p.m. but not until they go out for one last opportunity for nature to call. Don’t worry if they don’t, because nature doesn’t always call to them. We’re not too strict about that. (It was here that I wanted to pencil in – “or any other part of their lives.”)
    “They sleep in the pink room with the futon. Maggie likes to sleep up on top of it with one pillow and Charlie prefers the comforter that we’ve got on the floor. He probably won’t lie down until you fluff it for him – he’s kinda used to that.
    “They prefer the Animal Channel on TV but some nights they like Jay Leno and since it’s his last week and all, why don’t you turn that on for them. They’d probably regret if they missed his last shows.
    “Please turn on the television timer for 45 minutes before it shuts itself off for the night.     They like to stay up longer than 30 minutes but I think an hour gives them bad dreams.     And please don’t forget to turn on the ceiling fan in their room. With summertime and all,     I’m pretty sure they’ve been getting stuffy at night.
    “Thanks for doing this for us; we’ll be home Monday night. Call my cell, George’s cell or the vet’s cell if anything happens. Tell him you’re keeping our dogs and he’ll understand completely. We’ll be back soon.”
    OK, I may have exaggerated a tiny bit in there about what she wrote but not about the two key points. (1) Her hand-written letter was two-pages long. (2) Our vet might not know what’s wrong with the dogs, but he absolutely understands my wife.
    Seriously – is this normal or should I be worried about this woman?
    I don’t know, maybe it’s the empty nest syndrome having some delayed effect. Perhaps there’s a desire – or should I say a need – for her to have a grandchild – and soon.
    But I do know this. She never – and I do mean this literally – never, never, not once, did she leave a single written word of instruction for even one of our baby-sitters.
    I only recall a few words left hanging in the air as we bolted out the door to the movies, “… food’s in the kitchen, diapers are in the bedroom, any problems? call Grandma. We’ll be back soon.”
    Nancy asked me how my writing about her silly puppy concerns could ever be turned into something with a spiritual perspective. I told her that was easy, “Someone out there, please pray for me!”
    Dear God – We too often forget that the wonders of nature are your creation as well. Bless all those who work to protect them. Amen.
(George Valadie is principal of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Do you think they’ll try to kill us?’
By George Valadie
May 22, 2009
     How do you envision Jesus Christ? Not now, I don’t mean that one. Not the Jesus in heaven, not the one at our almighty’s right hand.
    I’m talking about the boy and the man who walked this same earth we now walk. None of us can understand his divine side. And I don’t believe any of them who were there then could either. I don’t know how to imagine that part of him.
    Yet he came here to accomplish a massive overhaul of humankind and our ways. How could he inspire that unless he could walk among them? And talk to them – and their hearts?
    That’s the Jesus I try to imagine. The man who got hungry and angry, the one who cried and the one who laughed.
    I like to think of him as a guy who enjoyed a good joke and could tell a great story. As a man who could just as easily be worn out by the heat of the day or the hard-headedness of those who wouldn’t listen. But kinder, gentler and more inspiring than most.
    With his Resurrection now passed, and his time here drawing to an end, he needed to call his apostles all together. What would he have said in that one last set of instructions?     How would that one final “go get ’em” sort of pep talk have sounded?
    It helps me if I imagine him talking to them the way I think I would have best understood him. It helps if I imagine him talking to me.
    “OK, guys, here we are. It’s game time. We’ve been gearing up for this for three years now. Think of all the hard work and preparation you’ve put in. I’m proud of you men. And I think you’re ready.
    “But one thing I’ve got to tell you is that I won’t be able to be here. So you guys have to try to win this thing without me.”
    “You got to be kidding, we can’t do that! We tried that for just those few days without you and you saw how that went.”
    “I know, I know … let’s consider that a dry-run of sorts. But that’s why we do them. Think back. I’d been telling you all along I’d be leaving but you didn’t want to hear me.
    “You freaked out and forgot all I had taught you and all we had worked on. You scattered like dogs and hid like cowards. I picked you guys – but I didn’t pick you for that.
    “But now, now you understand what it’s going to be like. And it won’t be any easier this time. Those guys on the other side take this stuff seriously.
    “When it gets down to it, they’re going to look you in the eye to decide how serious you are. They’re going to want to know how badly you really want all that we’ve been about this entire time.
    “They’re gonna stare you down, try to intimidate you, and try to get a grip on how willing you really are to go to war against most everything they’ve ever known and believed.
    “Don’t underestimate them either. They’re every bit as serious as we are. But I believe you’re ready.”
    “Yeah, but they tried to kill you over it. Do you think they’ll try that with us?”
    “They didn’t try to kill me. They did it. That’s OK though, people needed to know how much it meant to me. Heck, I needed you guys to know that, too. Judas wasn’t on board, Thomas is coming around. Peter tripped all over himself. But I feel better about it now.
    “But I won’t lie to you, you’ll face some rough and tumble guys out there who will make you earn everything you get.”
    “Come on please, no more parables, Jesus. You didn’t answer the question. Do you think they’ll try to kill us?”
    “I won’t lie to you. We’re the underdogs here. At least for now. Just hang in there, we’re going to win this. When things start going our way – and they will — don’t let yourselves get the bighead. That never helps. Because I guarantee they’ll be followed by trials so disheartening you’ll seriously consider giving it all up.
    “But I didn’t teach you that.
    “And keep your eyes open for those folks who try that sneaky stuff. Some will use our words against us, even pretend to be on our team, but they’re not. Not really. You’ll be able to tell.”
    “Will you be able to send us some occasional ideas if we get behind?”
“Honestly, I’ll be able to watch. And as tempted as I’ll be to call the occasional ‘time out,’ I’m not going to. You guys are ready and I’m counting on you. And don’t forget, you’ll always have my Spirit with you.
    “Don’t try to do it by yourself though. Keep me in mind. My Father started this, keep him in mind too. And don’t get too rushed about all this. Chances are you won’t actually get to see the end of the game. There will come a time when you have to sit down on the bench and let the young guys take over. Just teach them what I taught you and it will be fine.
    “Time to go. You’ll do great.”
    “My God, this is scary … if we get confused and strung out, or strung up, do you have any last words, something that will keep us focused when we lose ours? Anything to keep it simple?”
    “Love one another.”
Dear God – Who could teach this better than your son? Who could mess it up better than us? Help us understand the simple. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Race, age, gender – none seem to matter’
By George Valadie
May 8, 2009
     Thankfully, it’s been quite a while since we had gotten one. It was always what we feared. We might still actually.
    But if he’ll answer my prayers, I won’t ever have to get it again. The phone call, that is.
    The “There’s been a wreck” phone call “and you need to come.”
    Yesterday, Nancy and I were driving home from a fast food lunch. We had slept late and were treating ourselves to a sort of a celebratory “thank goodness” because the prom had been this weekend and we hadn’t received any such bad news calls.
    Officially, it had ended at midnight. Unofficially, I always wait until sometime the next day to declare it a success.
    We were in the left lane of one of the busiest highways in the area when I noticed drivers in the middle lane trying to forge their way into ours. Not the one you’d choose unless you’d be turning. Or unless the one you were in was clogged.
    You just knew there had been some sort of collision up ahead. When we drew close enough to rubber-neck, the strange but human reaction from which most of us suffer, Nancy noticed one of the kids lying on the side of the street attends our school.
    We arrived on the scene of a decent-sized mess, made by just one car and one truck that had blasted into each other virtually head on. All total there were three of our teenagers who had been in the car and a fourth — whom we didn’t know — had driven the other.
    There was plenty of metal left in both, but neither pile would be driven again.
We didn’t see it happen, but we didn’t miss it by much. Our three and the other young man seemed physically fine. All were a bit beaten up, shaken up and “scared to death” to borrow that commonly used phrase. But thankfully, none seemed to actually be flirting with the after-life.
    Of our three, one had already called his mom, one was getting her on the phone and one said she was waiting a bit. When I looked at her a bit questioningly, she said, “I need to get it together before I call her because she’ll freak out if I don’t.” I wish our daughter had done that.
    For it was right then that I was carried back to when our own three had been teenagers and the calls we had received. Yes, I said “calls,” that’s a plural word.
Sarah’s called more than once. Nancy answered the phone the first time, it went something like this:
    “Hello?” (no answer)
    “Sarah?” (no answer)
    “Is this you, Sarah?” (no answer)
    “Sarah?” (and then we got what sounded like irregular breathing, possibly tears, followed by … )
    “Wre-e-e-e-e-e-e-ck!!!!!!!”
    She wasn’t all that intelligible, but at least we could hear her voice. You run with the small things at times like that.
    When Meg had hers, it was different. Nancy took that one as well.
    “Hello.”
    “Is this Mrs. Valadie?”
    “Yes, who is this?”
    “This is the sheriff’s department and your daughter’s been in a wreck.” (pause)
    Now it was our turn to do the irregular breathing.
    “She’s going to be fine but we need you to come.”
    I don’t know, maybe they should begin this sort of call with that last part first. Thankfully, all we said goodbye to were the cars.
    I don’t know if I was surprised or amazed at all the wonderfully thoughtful people who dropped by this latest scene. Race, age, gender – none of that seemed to matter.
    One lady took turns, grabbed the hands of each of our girls on the ground and prayed with them. Sadly, I have to admit I hadn’t thought to do that.
    One grandmotherly lady contributed an eye-witness account she offered to the police and some Kleenex she gave to our girls. She offered what she had.
    Another stopped to actually get involved in the legal matters. “I saw it all. I’ll be glad to help if they need me.” You don’t see that every day.
    Our students had been on the way to a weekend school event. A teacher and other students there had heard the news and arrived back at jet-like speed, admitting they had no jet.
    And the EMTs, they were phenomenal. Professional. Efficient. In charge. And able to calm and convince these teens that – in spite of everything – in spite of who hit whom – in spite of who lost what — the important thing and the only thing that mattered was that all were alive. The rest, they said, was just stuff.
    You have to love the perspective of those who have seen those other times when so much more than that was lost.
    Eventually, there they were. Four parents at the same scene, thinking the same thoughts, having received the same call.
    This has been our fear. And it always will be.
Dear God – We pray for all those families whose greatest fear came true. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Just maybe, he was praying for us’
By George Valadie
April 10 , 2009
     Well, looking back, it might not have been all that suitable for Lent. Having second thoughts, you might say.
    My last column, I mean. Perhaps I went over the top when I targeted two guys I’ve never met, called them both greedy thugs, jumped all over them for brazen financial thievery and went so far as to say I hated them more than I hate serial killers.
    I got fired once and didn’t get that angry.
    This past week I attended a retreat – much needed you could probably tell. And there, the facilitator brought up the topic of forgiveness and Christ’s teaching on the topic.
    With Holy Week approaching, at the very least it seems I should work on giving it a try. No doubt I’ve got a ways to go.
    I found myself taken back to John’s Gospel where he relates the story of Jesus teaching near the Mount of Olives. He was in the temple one morning, a crowd gathered at his feet to learn.
    Then, pushing their way to the front, grabbing all the attention that comes with interruption, the Pharisees dragged out a woman “who had been caught in adultery.”
    Yes, I wonder how these men had actually come upon such a discovery and even more curious why the offending male – it does take two — wasn’t part of the accused and indicted. But that discussion is for another day.
    “We got you now … in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?”
    We’re used to reading of these tricks. They were always trying to tie him up with his own words, looking for any reason to pit him against the Mosaic law because no one could ever survive that sort of heresy.
    Skip to the end of the story. Jesus embarrasses all of them with maybe his snappiest comeback, “Any of you who haven’t messed up yet, go ahead and pick up the first rock.”
    Well, that would take a bit of nerve, wouldn’t it? These folks lived in a very small town.     Everybody knew everybody. And in such a place, everybody knows what everybody doesn’t want them to know. There weren’t going to be any rock throwers here today. Or any day.
    “Ma’am, they didn’t condemn you and neither will I. Go on – and get your life together.”
    But before he got to the verbal lesson of the day, theirs and hers — Scripture says “Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger.”
    Does anyone know why? And exactly what did he write there? Anyone can guess, anyone can imagine. So can I.
    How about this? “This is gonna be fun.”
    You just know he knew they were coming. He knew they’d be trying to make him look bad. And he had to have known exactly how this particular episode was going to turn out.     These guys wanted the spotlight but today would be his turn.
    Or maybe, he was inclined to write something like, “Are you kidding me?”
    He’d been teaching and preaching for going on three years and it was obvious some people still didn’t get it. Sadly, maybe they were never going to get it. Neither the     Pharisees – nor the woman. Was anybody listening?
    I could also see him scribbling, “I’ll be back.”
    Today – this little word puzzle from these un-learned learned men — this would be a piece of cake. These jokers were never going to be the real challenge. That would come in a few weeks when he returned right to this same mount to be betrayed. That’s when things would get really hard.
    Maybe this sandbox is where we first got introduced to the age-old adage “Patience is a virtue.”
    Can’t you imagine these hypocrites had been driving him crazy? Ever since he had begun this journey. Always acting as if they were who they were not. He had to have been fed up. Who wouldn’t have? I imagine even Jesus got worn out at times.
    Maybe it was never that complicated at all. Not a sentence but just a thought, a word, the obvious word. “Forgiveness.”
    Perhaps it was the concept he was trying to teach them and the world but then again, maybe he was trying to focus on all the forgiving he himself would soon be needing to do.     How could he ever empower the apostles to do what he couldn’t?
Sand’s not the best place to write words. So maybe it was just a picture. A crucifix. Three crucifixes. His mom’s face. The face of God.
    What if he had just been doodling? The way we all do. Squiggles and boxes, circles and stars. Could he have been creating the proverbial pregnant pause giving everyone there some time to think about their own sins?
    Or was it him needing a minute. Seeking the inspiration of the Spirit. Asking for the wisdom of the Father. Praying for the safety of the prostitute he had only just met.
    Or maybe, just maybe, he was praying for us.
    Dear God – We get nauseous when we know a bad meeting’s coming our way. What must it have been like to know that death lay ahead. And just because of what everyone else had done — and would do. “Thank You” just isn’t enough. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Just how much greed can one person have?’
By George Valadie
March 27, 2009
     “Caveat emptor.”
    Yes, I took two years of Latin. And yes, I probably learned the English translation way back in high school when they were making us study our requisite two years. But I doubt I had a clue what it meant. Not really. Not like I do now.
    “Let the buyer beware.”
    Perhaps they should have made us take a course that didn’t just translate the phrase but one that made sure we understood it. What about a course entitled, “How to be smart and safe if you ever have a few bucks you’d like to invest.”
    Here during the Lenten season, I suppose we should be trying to avoid, or at least improve upon our normal human faults. But I have to admit that I hate – and I use the word literally – I hate these people who have made their living by stealing from everyone else.
    And I don’t even know them.
    I’m not talking about the petty thief who swiped Nancy’s wallet at the convenience store. Or the other one who broke in and trashed our home only to find we didn’t own anything worth taking. Though I’m not all that happy about them either.
    But I find I have really, really awful – unusually horrible — feelings in my heart about the growing list of financial thugs like Bernard Madoff and Allen Stanford.
    Their names have been all over the news lately accused of defrauding investors out of billions of dollars. Just to be clear, I’m not one of them. Didn’t lose a penny with either.
    So I can’t imagine how I’d feel. Nor can I imagine how those who did can ever forgive.
    Since I never enrolled in that “be-smart-and-safe-with-your-money” class, I’m not entirely sure of all the very specific details about what these guys did. But I know they lured people in, earned their trust and then stole most everything they had.
    Was it possible that these victims should have known better? I honestly couldn’t tell you.
    Sure, I imagine some were likely trying to grab a quick and maybe undeserved few bucks. That can lead to years of regret. But we’re also talking about some folks whom you’d think were fairly astute. We’re talking about international banks and charitable foundations that were also among the taken.
    And they’re a lot smarter than I am.
    But what angers me most and engenders my hatred is that they also stole from so many other people who were just trying to be good stewards of their retirement. The same retirement we’ve all been told to save for.
    Much has been written about these scandalous rogues already, some comparing these high finance criminals to serial killers. Can you believe that?
    And I don’t really know why, but I don’t get nearly as emotional about the Jeffrey Dahmers and the Ted Bundys of the world. And they really were serial killers.
    I’m convinced those who choose to murder over and over and over are severely disturbed. They’re deranged or psychotic or obsessed with some something that’s just not normal.
    The lives they took are more valuable than money, but those killers were sick. These guys are just greedy. And conscious choice makes it seem worse. At least to me.
    They’re not sick, but they make me feel that way.
    Turns out the guy that took Nancy’s wallet was a common thief. He took our stuff, he scared her, and he brought us and our own little piece of suburban heaven face-to-face with crime. But he didn’t lure us in and he didn’t rob us of our future.
    And even if he had stolen thousands of our dollars, I could take a pretty good guess what he might do with it.
    I can think in terms of thousands. But what does someone do with billions of dollars? How much can you buy? How much do you need? And just how much greed can one person have?
    Perhaps you’ve read the recent news notes that have been written that have tried to get us more in touch with just how large a ‘billion’ is.
    A billion seconds ago, it was 1977.
    A billion minutes ago, Jesus was alive.
    A billion hours ago, our ancestors lived in the Stone Age.
    A billion days ago, no one walked the earth on two feet.
    A billion dollars ago for these guys was just a few more investors duped and a few more futures destroyed.
    I’m angry. I’m irritated. I’m enraged and outraged and however many other words my Thesaurus can list.
    And this is also one of those times when I’m confused. When God created free-will, he also knew people like this would make choices like that.
    Theologians as well as those of us who aren’t have long debated what God was thinking. I think I’ll always be confused.
    And I think they’ll always be crooks.
    Dear God – Please help us remember that there are so many more who choose good. Why don’t we make them famous? Why didn’t I write about them? Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Does God keep a scorecard?
By George Valadie
March 13, 2009
     “Dad, I’m craving something sweet.”
    “Well, come to our house. We’ve got half a five-flavor pound cake in the fridge, some chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer, a week-old cinnamon roll we’re preserving in the microwave and some thin-mint Girl Scout cookies I hid.”
    “No, no, what I meant was — I gave up sweets for Lent. Well, except for the cake I ate at that baby shower today.”
    “Well, why don’t you finish off the day with something else sweet, and then – since Sundays are sort of a day off from Lent — trade today’s bad Saturday for a good Sunday tomorrow?”
    “Do you think God will be OK with that?”
    And that’s how we ended up here – wondering if God keeps a scorecard.
    I don’t really think so but it’s hard for us humans to imagine that he doesn’t. It’s hard for us to imagine him at all.
    We’re not able to envision the unthinkable. Nor can we fathom the concept of the almighty, the all-loving, the all-forgiving or the all-anything.
    And we probably struggle most of all with having the sort of faith that believes it’s possible that any being – even God — is able to forgive us and then truly forget what we did.
    So we humans often see him just as we see ourselves. We often picture him as the God who not only has the ability to recall our lifetime of good and bad actions, but then does it, one scorecard at a time.
    It’s not the best way to envision God, but we can all be guilty at times.
    My father-in-law was as nice a human being as I’ve ever met. He financially bailed out our young marriage on more than a few occasions. He loved his wife dearly and made sure she never had to work a day outside the home. He provided Catholic schooling, a college education and a life of unfaltering love for his three daughters. He even loved their husbands.
    And he never missed Mass.
    But Pop kept his own score about how he was doing in that regard. And he was entirely convinced God kept one too. It was in his latter years of life that our church, his church, made changes in their expectations about which holy days now included an obligation for him to attend Mass and which ones did not.
    He never was quite sure. Nor am I for that matter. But he asked all of us to help him keep track of which was which because he would never allow himself to miss if it were required.
    But he wasn’t planning to attend if it weren’t. He led an honest life, too.
    There was also that Christmas Mass when he wasn’t enthralled with the singing. So he turned off his hearing aid and went the rest of the way from rote memory. Still, he was there and expected God to count it.
    In his final months, he remained committed to what he knew God wanted him to do. When he was overtaken by Alzheimer’s, he couldn’t remember conversations.
    He could no longer recall a few friends and family. But one memory he held was the one that told him he was supposed to be going to Mass. The idea had become more a part of his soul.
    And he truly worried that missing even one would be held against him. So much so, that he asked over-and-over-and-over again about who would be driving and what time they would be going.
    To help him deal, we asked our pastor to write him a letter that he could keep next to his chair. With that, he could recall – when needed — the medical dispensation he had been given. And he needed it often
    He’s not alone. Even when we’re not sick, we all worry about some of the things we don’t do well.
    When we missed that Sunday Mass on vacation because we claimed “tourist liberties,” how would God feel if we had made it up on Monday?
    When Meg lit her devotional candles at the grotto without contributing a dollar to the cause, were her prayers and intentions heard anyway?
    When I was 12 and my mom forgot and cooked burgers for us children on a Lenten Friday, was that the sin I accused her of back then?
    When Katy dropped the ball and failed altogether in her Lenten efforts, did it make a difference to God when she got it together for 40 days in the summer?
    And what if others of us never make it up at all?
    Sadly and embarrassingly, I’m right in there too. Giving myself credit with check marks in one column, admitting a few minus marks in the other, trying to imagine myself on the positive side of God’s ledger. Do some good here, claim a checkmark there.
    Sad, embarrassing … and stupid. Perhaps it’s not that complicated at all. Perhaps our Lenten season should simply be about being better today than we were yesterday. And hoping that tomorrow is even better than that. And trying to understand that keeping score is the one thing God refuses to do.
    If he does, why would he sacrifice his own son? And why would the son forgive his traitors? Those then? And those now?
    And who among us has a score that’s earned all of that?
    Dear God – If you are keeping score, do you allow extra credit? Please? Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Today wasn’t a very good day’
By George Valadie
February 27, 2009
    It wasn’t a very good day.
    It started out headed that way though. I was excited about how I thought this column would turn out because I had a sketched-out plan for some good news to mix in with all the economic nonsense.
    But I’ll have to admit, this won’t be anything at all like what I had hoped to write. I was just an hour from sitting down to my computer when – as it often happens – life interrupted life.
    The phone call was a sad one.
    I don’t get a lot of weekend phone calls to my cell, so when it does ring and it’s not one of our own kids, I always answer with a dose of cautious curiosity.
    With good reason this time. One of our students had passed away in the most tragic manner of all – self-inflicted.
    I suppose there are those who would consider me a bit off base by my suggestion that there are varying degrees of tragic dying. Especially for kids.
    I agree, after all, there is absolutely no manner in which a young person can die that is not tragic. Accident or illness, shockingly sudden or excruciatingly drawn out – leaving this world before one’s time is just wrong.
    But if you’re 14 and you’ve come to the conclusion that you just can’t do it anymore, it seems somehow worse.
    Thirty seconds later, I was out the door and headed to the office. Because there on my desk sits a plan for what to do. Lists of how to handle and how to communicate. Counselors to call and teachers to inform. What we should say to whom and a list of comments we’d be better to avoid.
    First, how crazy is it that school principals even have such a thing! Sadly, each of our own lives now includes bits and pieces of crisis plans that tackle just about anything horrible that the horrible people have already dreamed up. Ours is some 50-plus pages long.
    Thumb through it and you’ll find multiple sections for any number of unthinkable thoughts and yes, sadly – there’s even one for “student deaths.”
    But you know what there’s not?
    There’s not a word in there to say to a mom and dad who are out of their minds with grief and shock. No suggestions for the parents who – if they’re anything like me – would just simply be out of their minds.
    So in and among an afternoon of dozens of phone calls to all who needed to know, I was also sitting alone with my thoughts.
    Thinking about a kid who won’t come to school tomorrow. And struggling to imagine a mom and dad who are now face-to-face with the realization that same kid won’t come home from school tomorrow either – or ever.
    Someone please tell me what brings any young person to the conclusion that it’s not going to get any better? Ever? Whatever their “it” might be?
    How does any teenager come to feel as if they’re now drowning, dragged down by the sort of weight for which they can see no relief? Not just a heavy load to carry around, but one to which they are forever chained and from which there is no escape. Worse, from which they feel no hope of escape.
    How does life cloud teenage perception so that they’re unable to see loving family and willing friends?
    And what of the lifetime that remains un-lived? What would they have been? Who could they have been? What would they have accomplished? What’s that quote – “The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.”
    That’s us. Shedding our tears for the kids who never get the chance to be.
    Normally, it’s easier for me to think like a parent. But not these parents. I spent the day trying to imagine the depth of their pain but honestly, I just can’t. This is the unimaginable sort.
    How many questions will they ask? How many non-existent clues will they try to recall?     How many what-ifs will haunt their dreams?
    Honestly, and this might be the wrong venue to say it, but I could see where – should it happen to me – I would be the one to lose a child and then my faith. Let’s forget for a moment it’s impossible to understand God – much less understand this – and it’s a whole lot easier to doubt him.
    Though not at all proud of it, I just might.
    Which is why I spent a lot of my afternoon praying for them too. We can discuss it and debate it, but we’ll never get it. That is not God’s way. And as a result of unanswered prayers and unexplained tragedies, we are often left wondering about what we are told is an all-loving God.
    So we pray with all we have. For parents who will feel that they’re in the bowels of hell for quite some time. For family and friends and all who grieve this loss. And for us too.
    Today wasn’t a very good day.
    I prayed for perspective, but it never came.
    But I’ve got hope for tomorrow.
    Dear God – You’ve got quite a few we’d like to have back. If not for a lifetime, at least for a minute? Please help us not waste the minutes we have. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`God, help us remember there’s a better way’
By George Valadie
February 13, 2009
    I just don’t know anymore.
    I picked up our paper and read headlines about what seemed like one more story about one more shooting death.
    Sadly, there are more than a few to read about. But this one grabbed my attention because it landed way too close to home. Literally, just a mile or so down the road. A very wide, well-traveled road, the one I’m on every single day.
    It happened in a parking lot just off that road, another senseless killing caused by what     I was sure was another desperate thief wanting what wasn’t his.
    I was wrong. My first off-the-cuff reaction was a bit of shock because I’ve been in that parking lot and I’ve eaten in that restaurant. And it’s right next door to yet another eatery that does more business than that. So we’re talking about a pretty busy place.
    And then there was that eerie feeling that comes with the realization that the violence had now moved beyond our inner city – as if that would have made it any more acceptable. Shame on me.
    But perhaps the most incredible of all were the details of the story. Dinner was over. A 52-year-old man and his three children had just finished a family birthday and all four were headed out to their car.
    They arrived there to encounter an adjacently parked car and its husband and wife owners. The paper wasn’t quite clear about who said what to whom but it was clear that an argument ensued.
    Apparently words were exchanged and tempers were elevated. There were some almost moments of sanity followed by some almost moments of calm followed by we-just-couldn’t-leave-well-enough-alone.
    Out comes a gun, down goes a dad. Right in the chest. With his three kids watching.
    And – I kid you not – the argument was about one car being too closely parked to the other.
    If reports are accurate, no car was bumped, no paint was scraped. Nothing and no one had been injured except some feelings. Who would have imagined the results — one funeral and years of prison time?
    Whatever happened to “no harm, no foul.”
    “Excuse me, but it seems you may have parked your car a bit too close to ours. We’re having a little trouble getting in our car. Any chance you could help us with our problem?”
    “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I thought I was centered between the lines. It’s these big cars, you know. I haven’t mastered how to park it just yet.”
    “Well, you know both of us have one. It’s just harder than it used to be. Never mind, maybe I can pull out and we’ll be good to go.”
    Yeah, right. Sounds as if it was more like, “Move your car or else.”
    “Or else what?”
    Bang.
    I just don’t know anymore. Where have our manners gone? Our civility? Our sense of tact? Why do we fire before we aim? Before we think? Why do we make the dramatic leap from irritation to all-out assault on those who are irritating?
    Use any cliché you want. Look before you leap. Think before you speak. You catch more flies with honey. We know them, but we don’t use them. Not anymore.
    None of us have killed anyone, but I don’t think we have to go that far to see the problem. In the last five years, I’ve seen a remarkable increase in the quantity of communications I receive that are just plain rude. I don’t know, maybe I deserve them.         Maybe I’m not the principal or the person I used to be. I’m not ruling out that possibility.     But I’ve never received so many.
    I see people (me too) firing off not completely-thought-out thoughts. People replying with words that are intended to out-blast, not out-think.
    We speak, we write, we blurt without passing any of it through a filter. Think it? Feel it?     Why not say it?
    Though e-mail has its obvious advantages, I believe it needs improvement. It needs to be able to sense if we’re writing with our heart, our head or neither.
    Perhaps it could have a memory file of several thousand insulting words. If you type one of those, your computer locks up and refuses to “send” until such time that you come to your senses. The length of that delay could be determined by sensing the degree of force with which you were banging on the keyboard.
    Or maybe our computers could read but then re-draft, with less abusive suggestions that substitute for our thoughtlessness.
    Would a better computer stop someone from shooting someone else over an absurd argument about an even more absurd topic? I doubt it.
    So maybe that’s a really stupid idea. (I’m OK with insulting myself.) But I believe we do need some sort of help. Some sort of return to a time when we knew better. Or maybe a time when we just tried harder.
    Dear God – Every so often, we forget. We lose sight and we lose track. Please help us remember there’s a better way. Yours. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`Be sure to convert before you go dark’
By George Valadie
January 30, 2009
     I finally did it. I went and checked it out.
     I’d been putting it off, mostly because I’m very much a put-it-off sort of person. But there were other reasons.
     First, I’ve been pretty sure all along that I was going to be fine, though that idea didn’t work out all that well when I finally looked into the whole skin cancer thing. You’d think I’d learn.
     But I was also a bit afraid that if I were wrong, it would cost me money and who doesn’t try to avoid that sort of news.
     Thankfully, turns out all is well. I can relax. My television is still going to work when D-Day hits.
     As you have likely heard, Digital Day is coming on Feb. 17. And something, though I’m not quite sure what, is going to change and some televisions are no longer going to work.
     I’ll give them credit; they’ve done a great job forewarning us. My nightly local news has been telling me – nightly – for quite some time. But mostly, they keep telling me to check their website to get all the details.
     And I’ve put that off until today. When I got to their site, I was greeted with a countdown ticker. Warning: You have 23 days … 11 hours … 27 minutes … 14 seconds … 13 … 12 . . . .
     So maybe this really is important. It eerily reminded me of when the world and all our computers flipped over to the unknown dangers of Y2K on Jan. 1, 2000. We survived that,      I suppose we’ll manage this as well.
     Three years ago, on Feb. 1, 2006, the federal government declared a final deadline when local television stations can no longer broadcast the old-fashioned way. Apparently, magnetic waves are bulky and hog up way too much space in the very scarce and valuable broadcast spectrum.
     Honestly, I don’t have a clue what any of that means. It’s difficult for me to imagine how things that are invisible can be too large. Nor does it make sense to me how these things that travel via the air apparently don’t have enough air in which to travel.
     But that was the date our government set for the deadline that is now almost here - exactly three years and 17 days into what was then the future. No, I don’t understand that either. But we’ll save the topic of government confusion for another day.
     So here we are. Televisions that work via antenna won’t work that way now. No more rooftop monstrosities. No more rabbit ears with all that foil. No more twisting, turning and holding your breath as you try to sneak away from your set, as if it knew.
     Cable and satellite folks will remain undisturbed making our house good except for a little one in our bedroom. But estimates indicate some 24 million homes don’t have a cable connection and will be going dark without the necessary converter box.
     What do we make of all of this? I’m not at all sure except to know that people much smarter than I believe this is important. Better quality, improved efficiency, greater availability – I suppose these are all worthy of achieving. However, someone deems this critical enough that it’s in need of mandating.
     Televisions were invented in 1927, taking 80+ years for the changeover. What will be next? You just gotta know that other things are on the way.
     How about cars that were invented in 1889? In the search for much needed energy efficiency, when will the future unleash that new gasoline that means our vehicles will no longer work?
     Let’s be honest, they already know how to make it, but it just doesn’t mesh with our cars. Surely the day is coming when it someone will finally pull the trigger that makes the sort of fuel we use far more important than the sort of car we own?
     “Hear ye — On Feb. 1, 2015, your gasoline powered car will no longer function without a new something-or-another that is available at registered and approved vendors.”
     But history tells us – we can do these things. If you give us enough notice, mostly we’ll be fine. I just checked. Our warning is now down to 23 days … 9 hours … 37 minutes … 26 seconds … 25 … 24 . . . .
     Tickers make me nervous. They often cause me to ponder the larger perspective. Such as, how much time do I have left before – you know – I have no more time?
     Two thousand years ago, I’m guessing Christ issued the only caution we ever needed.      I don’t know exactly what he said, but it could have sounded something like “Warning — Your eternity’s not going to work out all that well unless you have gotten everything in order.
     “Be sure to re-direct your energy. Actually, you should have changed by now. Yes, many have done so already but please get the news out to the many who haven’t.
     “I have come to announce a better way. And it’s required. Your old stuff, the previous possessions, all the acquisitions – these are taking up too much valuable space in the spectrum of your life. They are interfering with the message I’m trying to send.
     “The wrong ideas will not work when it’s time. Be sure to convert before you go dark.”
     Where do we go to check on that?
     Dear God – We keep making some things better. Sometimes, it’s actually the important things. Please inspire us to improve some people. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘We need more bar graphs in our lives’
By George Valadie
January 16, 2009
     In our little corner of the world of Catholic high schools, this is one of our very busiest seasons.
     Actually, teenagers are not ever really not busy. Think perpetual motion – on hormones.
     But currently we find ourselves in the process of receiving, organizing, evaluating – and more importantly – deciding the fate of those who have submitted applications to attend next year.
     To assist with all that, Nancy is my wife and one of our two front office secretaries. People have long questioned the sanity of such a spousal/working arrangement, wondering how it allows us to co-exist on either front.
     Truthfully, it’s never been a problem, not even once. On those occasions when a parent or a teacher thinks my decision-making has gone round the bend, her loyalty has been unequivocal.
     She listens, she empathizes, and then she always relates some anecdote of our family life that demonstrates that I can irritate her just as easily.
     During the most recent week of our admissions efforts, she had the task of stuffing and mailing. Not yet at a final decision, we still needed to return admission testing results.
     She came home one recent afternoon to report on her day when she announced, “I miss my old bar graphs!”
     Earlier in our marriage, we used to say things to each other that we understood. Not so much anymore.
     “OK, dear, I wish you could find them, whatever they are.”
     “Oh, you know. I spent the day stuffing all these test results into envelope after envelope. I didn’t have time to read a word other than just to make sure that the right results were going to the right parents.
     “I think we give a better impression to families when they get information about their own child, not someone else’s, don’t you?”
     That’s why I keep her in the office.
     “Anyway, when I got to the last one I decided to read what we were sending them.           And it turns out we mostly send them a lot of educational lingo to try to explain what their kids are good at – and what they’re not.
     “But on the last page, it all came into focus. The testing company provided several bar graphs. Those are just a whole lot easier to understand.
     “Don’t you remember them back when we were in school? I loved getting those. The tall graphs were good and I used to get quite a few of those. The little short graphs weren’t. It was an easy way to know what I had been doing well.
     “I loved those bar graphs! And I miss them.”
She’s right, you know.
     We need more bar graphs in our lives. I’m not talking about then, I’m talking about now. Or at least something similar that’s official, easy to read and quick to the point. Something clear and concise that gives us a progress report on how life is going.
     We don’t much learn spelling anymore because we have SpellChek. Calculators save us from our math mistakes. And the internet provides us all sorts of information and answers to help make up for our other bar graphs that never got all that high.
     But our lives have moved on. And today we need information about these more important parts.
     How are our parenting skills? What does that graph look like? Did the girls learn independence, responsibility, how to handle the good times, how to survive the ones that aren’t? Are they ready to be good partners in marriage? Are they ready to be good moms?
     What sort of graph would measure my friendship? Or my citizenship? To those I like? And those I don’t? What about the people who need me but aren’t the ones I invite to dinner? Am I thoughtful? Can they count on me? Will I tell them the truth?
     What does the bar graph for my workplace look like? Would I be the first one the boss hires and the last one she fires? Would my colleagues vote the same way? Am I ethical? Non-gossiping? Do I make the place better than if I worked somewhere else?
     And what of my spiritual life? Is there more to it than church on Sunday? Is my faith growing? Or is it still a lot like it used to be? Most importantly, will God really welcome me home if I came knocking today?
     Thankfully, it’s another New Year. Undetermined. Wide open. Not a word has been written.
     No notes on the page. No unmet promises. No unfinished projects.
     We have nothing but opportunity and dreams, potential and possibility. But wouldn’t 2009 seem much easier if we could take advantage of where we excel and tackle the parts that we don’t.
     But it’s incredibly difficult. Mostly because we’re too close to all of this. Too close to ourselves. Who wants to guess? And who wants to flounder about?
     We just need a good set of bar graphs.
     Dear God – It was easier back then. Go here, go there. Do this, do that. Free will should come with a report card. Or is that our conscience? Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Who doesn’t have a great Christmas tree story?
By George Valadie
December 19, 2008
     Well, we did it. We crossed the great divide of wherever we were to wherever we are. We purchased our first ever artificial Christmas tree. Pre-lit, no less.
     In case anyone ever asks, I can tell them it’s supposed to have 1,000 lights and some 2,673 different tips. The directions suggested we count everything to make sure. I’m just going with it.
     There was a time when our family wouldn’t even consider it but we’ve been close to having this discussion for the last several years. Nancy is a Yuletide traditionalist at heart, so I had been trying to encourage this purchase but feeling the need to tread very, very slowly. These are things that take time.
     See, I’ve been pouting the last few years, so I’ve gotten a bit bolder.
Because you know how it is, you sweat like a racehorse just to saw off the bottom of the darn thing, because the guy at the store tried but didn’t get it quite right.
     And then there’s that part where you’re trying to balance it in the stand, tighten the four screws at the bottom, fasten the two last-chance safety strings to both corners of the nearby window frames all while standing across the room to make sure it comes together.      While they’re eating the cookie dough in the next room!
You know we’re winding it up when we get to the “OK now, does anyone want to help hang the tree lights?” which is always followed by more deafening silence.
     Per our family tradition, we conclude the tree decorating ceremony with our annual “That’s nice, dear, but there doesn’t seem to be nearly enough in the upper right hand corner. Is it too late to move some?”
     You’d think this decision would be an easy one. After 31 years, we finally sat down to talk about it when Nancy admitted, “George, here’s the honest truth. I don’t want to help you hang any lights and you don’t do it worth a darn. Can we buy a pre-lit artificial tree this year?”
     Who doesn’t have a great Christmas tree story to tell?
     The first one we ever bought as a married couple was purchased to serve two purposes. First, I felt the need to take it into what was my first classroom and set it up there to add to the students’ holiday ambience. I thought it was cool but my cool and theirs have never been the same.
     Once exams were over, I brought it home to an apartment that wasn’t nearly as tall or as spacious as a school building. There, in our little rented living room, it had the feel of a redwood, longing for the open air spaces of something more like the Rockefeller Center. But we loved it – and we laugh about it.
     Not too many Christmases later, I was serving in my first year as principal of the elementary school where my two older children were attending. Our Home & School Association parents were tackling their first-ever Christmas tree fund-raising sale.
     With hundreds pre-sold and seeming to be quite the success, the trees were to be delivered on a Saturday morning from a tree farm in the north.
     It turns out they had been cut, tied up with rope, and loaded on the truck only hours before freezing weather blasted the whole batch of them. Still, with an anxious crowd of parents and little grade-schoolers waiting, the tree truck arrived right on schedule.
     I wish you could have been there. The trees were unloaded, un-tied and stood there frozen vertically rigid in their pencil-shaped forms. Kids were crying, parents wanted refunds, and the organizers were in shock.
     Our kids were no different. But being the dutiful principal, I supported the cause and loaded up our tree to the horror of my children and the scowl of my wife. A tree that would have easily fit into a phone booth, ornaments and all.
     But we loved it – and we laugh about it. Thankfully, you can thaw out a frozen tree and it looks OK … the second Christmas miracle if you ask me.
     The next year, a dear friend invited us to take our young girls on a drive into the nearby countryside and actually cut down a fresh tree from our friend’s woodsy property. Seemed like the perfect Christmas tradition to begin, though I admit, the four of us and a tree would fit snugly in our Ford Pinto.
     As best they could tell, at ages 6 and 8, there wasn’t a single tree out there that looked like any they had seen on television. Throw in the cold weather, the tromping through the woods and Nancy hollering, “Don’t you cut one of my babies with that saw,” and well … you get the picture.
     Trying to help them get a fresh new sense of the season, all I could hear was “Why don’t we just buy one like everyone else gets to do?” The kids felt that way too.
     Sadly, or gladly, depending on who you talk to, we never went again. But we loved it – and we laugh about it.
     It’s never about the tree, is it? Not really. It’s not about the stuff that merely decorates this holiday.
     It’s much more about the stories and the people and the love that surround us.
I’m not sure who said it, but they didn’t miss it far, “Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening the presents and just listen.” May this Christmas add one more precious memory your family will re-tell forever.
     Dear God – We think of all sorts of strange things to honor your greatest gift. We mean well, we do. Thank you for understanding when we get it right in our hearts. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Maybe holiday thing starts too early’
By George Valadie
December 5, 2008
     OK, I give.
     Maybe the holiday season does begin too early. But I’ve never been one of those that ever really thought so. True, we can all get a bit stressed, trying to get here and there, trying to buy this and that.
     But for the most part, I’ve always believed the holidays make us a happier sort. I see more smiles, more patience, more effort to share with others.
     Answer honestly now. How many other times during the rest of our year do we bake cookies for the mailman? Or buy a gift for an orphan? Write a check for the homeless? Or any of the number of things we do when we’re better at life than usual.
     And – sad as it is — how many other times this year will we reach out to some family member that we’re not all that crazy about? Maybe we’ll share a meal. Possibly a gift. Sometimes it’s just a card. And though it might be a bit awkward or uncomfortable, none of that’s bad. Is it?
     So I never could see how those sorts of things can actually begin too early?
     But maybe we’ve finally hit the wall. Can we possibly be taking this giving thing too far?
     No doubt you’ve heard or read about the tragedy that occurred the day after Thanksgiving in New York. We killed a man. In an effort to get a jump start on spreading holiday cheer, we handed out a big old dose of anguish and death. On Black Friday.
     Two-thousand people lined up outside a Wal-Mart to be the first to benefit from their 5 a.m. sale. Well, that’s not exactly accurate. I don’t think anyone lined up at all.
     And as a result, it sounds as if those two thousand shoppers tried to get through the same door at once. They rushed the door, mangled the frame and then, unbelievably, trampled the man whose task was to let them in.
     I don’t know that I want to see any video but I almost need to so I can understand it.      If you can actually understand such.
     I’m finding it difficult to imagine how people stampede a fellow human being for a bunch of stuff in a store – any stuff, any store. Knock him down … maybe. Kick him in the shin while running by … I get that. An elbow in the gut … at the worst.
     But to step on a fellow – again and again and again – my brain won’t process that.
     Think about it. This wasn’t a boatload of grain being delivered to a malnourished nation of walking skeletons. These folks weren’t rushing to gather food that might save their lives. This mayhem was about high-def and blue-ray. Is there any irony in wanting to see your TV more clearly while you cannot see the hand in front of your face? His hand.
     Some reports say this gatekeeper weighed in at almost 270 pounds so you’d think that someone would have tripped over him and hit the floor themselves.
     But then someone else would have tripped over those two. And on and on and until there was an unmanageable mountain of humanity clogging up the doorway. Doesn’t it seem like we’d step back, get up, brush off, issue our apologies and move on?
     Oh no, they used this falling man as nothing more than a tiny little bump on their road to the falling prices.
     On the same page of newspaper, I read an equally disturbing report. Apparently there exists such a thing as a Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood. With 1,400 members, they have embarked on a letter writing campaign to the nation’s toy manufacturers asking the industry cut back on their marketing to children.
     If I may, let me quote one of the parent letters from this coalition, “Unfortunately, I will not be able to purchase many of the toys that my sons have asked for; we simply don’t have the money … by bombarding them with advertisements … you are placing me in the unenviable position of having to tell our children that we can’t afford the toys you promote.”
     To which I say, welcome to the world of parenting.
     To which I say, you better not let your boys play with friends or visit their homes or watch television or be normal.
     To which I say, don’t let their school counselor expose them to private colleges.
     To which I say, use this moment to teach what other parents teach. “Santa has many children to help all over the world,” or “We want to leave some for the other boys and girls,” or maybe the best of all, “We don’t always get everything we want.”
     Because if you don’t help them learn that, perhaps they’ll grow into adults who will believe they must get their own kids whatever it is they will want – no matter the cost. Be it money or life. Yours or someone else’s.
     I don’t know. Maybe the holiday thing starts too early. Maybe not early enough. But it doesn’t matter if we can’t find the part that matters.
     Dear God – When you decided to send the gift of your Son, did you ever envision the insanity of our celebrations? Of course you did send him to save us, apparently from ourselves. Thank you. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale High School in Cordova, Tenn.)

At least one person dies from
hunger every 3-4 seconds
By George Valadie
November 21, 2008
     Strange as it may sound, I recently got invited to be part of my first famine.
     It wasn’t much of one really, especially when you think of the definition of the word.           “Famine — a drastic and wide-reaching food shortage.” My thesaurus offers synonyms like dearth and destitution, drought and misery.
     Usually, there’s a lot of death, too. We can’t forget the death.
     This particular famine was only 30 hours long, so perhaps a “fast” would be a better word. No one starved, no stomachs suffered, no one lost an ounce.
     But I’m hoping there was learning. At least I think it may have been a start.
     You never can tell what will excite our students. Maybe that’s why I like being around them – everyday is different.
     They turned out in record numbers for our Homecoming Dance but could have cared less about a costume dance for Halloween.
     They attend football games in droves but none of our springtime sports ever get that sort of attendance. They devour chicken tenders and fries at lunch but don’t have much taste for chicken salad and chips.
     They get beamingly excited about a good report card but not nearly as energetic about the preparation that produces one. Their weekend body clocks can handle some pretty late hours but their weekday clocks run slower, much slower. Or so they tell me. They’re a kick, for sure.
     So who would have guessed there would be much interest in attending our school’s first 30-hour famine.
     Hear ye, hear ye — come and be hungry. Actually, we had to turn them away.
     They were told they couldn’t eat, they were told it would cost them money, they were told they would go home tired. And still they came.
     To be fair, the idea was not ours. It is an educational activity from one of the many world-wide organizations educating people and raising funds for the suffering souls around the world who know what famine and hunger are really about.
     I had never been in a fake famine, much less a real one but the conversation inspired me to learn more.
     Google a famine, any famine.
     The first to pop up was about Ethiopia, which is reported to have lost one million of its citizens in the famines of ‘84 and ‘85.
     Apparently, there were two famines, back-to-back? Can you believe that?
     And one million dead people. Can you imagine that? Both stretch my mind beyond where it can go.
     I don’t know how anyone anywhere can accurately measure such things, but the rate currently being reported states 25,000 people die from hunger daily.
     Let’s do the math … at least one person leaves us for good every 3-4 seconds.
     One-thousand-one.
     One-thousand-two.
     One thousand-three.
     One-thousand-four.
     I can’t imagine that either.
     If you excuse the expression, hungry people eat at me.
     I don’t know how they get that way, especially here in this country. But I’m entirely sure some are in their disastrous state due to lousy decisions they’ve made. And I don’t mean their retirement investments.
     Drugs, alcohol, foolishness and waste, whatever, they are where they are because they put themselves there.
     Should we help them? I don’t know. Should we feed them? I don’t know that either, but as irritated as they make me, no matter how many consequences they have rained down upon themselves, does anyone believe they’ve earned death by starvation.
     Not to mention their children who didn’t make even one of those decisions.
     And then there are the many, many – millions, I guess – whose only sin is having been born in the wrong part of the world. No food, bad water, lousy climate, criminal despots … some or all of the above. Hungry people everywhere.
     But I feel like I’m preaching to the choir. The majority who read this publication are likely members of the church, believers in, if not disciples of, the man who said “Whenever you have done this for the least of my brethren, ....”
     We’re already organizing donation drives at our churches and food drives at our schools. We’re already volunteering at food banks and serving at soup kitchens.
     So what else can we do?
     Mother Teresa said, “If you can’t feed 100 people, then feed just one.” Perhaps we can add to that. “If you can’t recruit 100 volunteers, recruit just one.”
     Inspire one more human and you’re responsible for one less hungry one. Let’s do that sort of math.
     Dear God – Are there not enough workers? Or not enough food? Neither seems like a place you would create. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Power of prayer both amazes, confuses me
By George Valadie
November 7, 2008
     To this very day, I am both amazed and confused by the power of prayer. Often, one follows the other. And sometimes both feelings happen at once.
     My personal prayer life began long, long, ago. I guess I was four or five.
     My memory, much less accurate and a lot less vivid than it used to be, allows me to picture myself kneeling down every night beside my bed. I don’t remember the bed or the room, but I know it was there that I dutifully recited the “Now I lay me ….” though I was never sure – and I’m still not — if that was its real title.
     It was a recitation for sure. Did I actually pray? I know I didn’t have a clue about what I was saying or to whom I was saying it, but I knew Mom smiled when I did.
     A bit later, when I could comprehend all the words of that prayer, I quit using it. I guess it’s because I’ve never liked thinking about my death, especially one that might happen in the dark of night. Not then, not now.
     I also recall wrapping up each night’s prayers with the requisite addendum of “God bless my mom, my dad, and my three sisters.” I doubt I knew exactly why I was doing that either. I had never worried about them being gravely ill or getting hit by a car. And there were days I didn’t even like all of them.
     So though they didn’t seem to need me, it was what my mom taught me. I still do it today.
     In the interest of full disclosure, prayer has probably not been the most devout or consistent part of my life. There have been stretches when I pretended it wasn’t all that important. Those were the stretches when I was stupid.
     As most young people do, I began my prayer life by praying mostly for me. Well, not so much for me really, but more for the things I needed.
     I remember having lost my baseball glove and begging for its immediate return. Not that it was in danger, but more that I was if I couldn’t find it.
     My guess is that it eventually turned up – just where I had left it. And thus realized I had only been forgetful, not in need of any real miracle after all. Sadly, I’m sure I gave myself the credit and doubt that I offered even a word of thanks.
     Is it possible that was God answering the call of a scared little kid in need of what he thought was a miracle? There’s no reason he wouldn’t or couldn’t. Or was he just amused at a 10-year-old’s messy room and a way messier view of what God was all about?
     I’m guessing he enjoyed the latter.
     Still, have you ever seen or heard about some thing or some event that has occurred for which there was absolutely no human or earthly explanation?
     In other words, do you know of a miracle from God?
     The curing of cancer. The recovering of an alcoholic. The melting and mending of what seemed like a frozen and un-thaw-able heart. Maybe our own.
     Lourdes. Medjugorje. Calvary.
     One more chance. One last chance. Just one chance – period.
     Years ago, we needed $67.25 – I kid you not – to get a physical for our oldest daughter so she could get into kindergarten. Burdened with no savings and too much pride to ask for help, we decided to have a garage sale.
     When day was done, Nancy tallied the profits and we had earned exactly $67.25. To this day, she believes it was a miracle. I’m not so sure it wasn’t.
     But then there are those other times, when – in spite of all the prayers, not just mine but those of hundreds of people so much holier than I – in spite of all that, there are those times when my prayers and your prayers do in fact go unanswered. Or at least the answer is an emphatic “no.”
     I don’t get it. How does he choose from among the pray-ers? And how does he choose from among the prayed-for? I know one thing, I wouldn’t be good at being God.
     Currently, my nightly prayer list includes two people, both of whom have been suffering from a disease that has the potential to end their time here.
     Actually, I’m just one infinitely small piece of a massive network of inter-connected people who are praying for them.
     Thus far, one seems well on the road to recovery. And he has said over and over again that he is so thankful for the bounty of prayers that he knew had been offered for him. He said he could actually feel them wrapping around him. That it gave him serenity.
     And the second young lady – well, she has lost hope. She’s had the same number of praying and prayerful people working her side of this battle. But her prognosis is grim and depressing. And in my opinion, most unfair.
     Prayer. Amazingly powerful and incredibly confusing.I will forever believe in it, I just don’t get it.
     Dear God – At times, we get frustrated with our human inability to understand. And yet you know our frustrations are just another form of prayer. Thank you for hearing them. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Which neighbors should we love greatest?’
By George Valadie
October 24, 2008
     Lately, I wish I could ask him just one more time.
     But this time, in the spirit of the oft-seen press conference, I, too, would ask my own “follow-up” question. No tricks intended, I just need a clarified answer.
     “Teacher, I have a question and then a follow-up. First, can you tell us which commandment in the law is the greatest?”
     I need a review because I think his answers would help me decide what I have decided is my most undecided vote. I really am flustered and looking for advice. Well, not really, I’ve had plenty of that. I’m looking for some expert advice. A real expert.
     Maybe it’s because I’ve paid more attention to this presidential election than any other in my lifetime. Maybe it’s because this one is so groundbreaking in terms of race and gender. Or maybe it’s because the darn thing has gone on and on and on.
     But whatever the reason, I’m really in to this one.
     I’ve seen all the nasty ads and though no one ever admits to actually being nasty, they all seem to end with someone approving the message. I’ve read quite a bit and I find myself with little more than a personal struggle to decipher the lines between reporting news, commenting on it and trying to create it.
     I’ve also tried to siphon through the noise of the TV talking heads, none of whom seem to want to use theirs. And all the spin makes my head, well … spin.
     I’ve watched the debates where no one answers any questions, and gotten a robo-call where no one lets me talk. I’ve even gone on the internet to one of those sites that asks me questions and then tells me who I’m really for. And I’d never even heard of that guy.
     Nancy and I try to discuss it as best we can. But it’s one topic we don’t do very well. For our entire lives, she has favored one political party, I mostly align with the other.
     She tries to explain me to her friends by saying I have a good heart but I’m just mis-guided. She laughs at it, but believes it to the core.
     These haven’t been the only sources of information I’ve received. Not that long ago, my Sunday church bulletin came complete with a foldout flyer of additional literature we were obviously being encouraged to read.
     It seems I’ve seen more essays and position statements on the rights and duties of voters – and in particular Catholic voters – than ever before.
     Honestly, these might be the same exact pieces of church information that have come out in every other previous election. I easily could have missed it, I’ll admit that.
     Or maybe our church is more involved in this one as well.
Put it all together and I’m left struggling with which lever to pull.
     Two thousand years ago, the Teacher didn’t mince a single word answering that question. From what I can tell, he went straight to the heart of the matter.
     Though I could never say it as eloquently, it went something like this: “The first and greatest (commandment) is to love God with all your heart and every other piece of you too.”
     But he didn’t stop there, adding “And don’t forget the second one. Love your neighbor as yourself.”
     No one had asked him to name the top two. So it must have been important to him.
     If I recall, the Jewish people had grown up with several thousand laws of their own, not to mention the 10 that God had supplied.
     And of all those many dictates from which he could choose to answer that question – some issued by his own father — he up and delivers two brand new ones. And for a little dramatic effect, he says these are the two most important anyone could ever follow.
     Somewhere in those holy words of Scripture, is, I think, a message about how to vote. I think.
     We received yet another priestly commentary at last week’s Sunday Mass. We were encouraged to not only vote but to do so in a way that meshes our spiritual lives and our civil ones.
     I’m on board with all of that. But confused as to where that actually takes me. Or even where it’s supposed take me?
     “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
     And here is where I wouldn’t let him off the stage until I could inject my follow-up question.
     “Teacher, OK, now, can you tell us which of all our neighbors should we love the greatest?
     “The unborn? Those who are born but not to anyone who knows what they’re doing?      The hungry? The homeless? The imprisoned? The sinners? The people trying not to? The people inside our country? Or do you even care about geo-political boundaries that were never part of any creation of yours? The abandoned kids? The abandoned elderly?      Orphans? And what’s the word for old people with no family? The ailing? The dying? Those who want to? And those who don’t?”
     No one here seems to agree.
     Dear God – Once again, free will is never the gift we think it is. We’d hate it if we didn’t have it – and sometimes – we hate it when we do. Please send some wisdom with it. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Family visit evokes intensive house cleaning
By George Valadie
October 10, 2008
     I love Jane and Buddy and I love when they come to visit. I really do.
     But if they came any more often, I’d be dead.
     Jane is Nancy’s oldest sister and Buddy is our brother-in-law and they’ve lived in Oklahoma City since before I knew them. So we’ve never gotten to visit with each other as often as we’d like.
     We’re excited because they’ll be here soon to spend a stopover day on the way to their vacation in the Smokey Mountains. Well, it won’t really be a day, more like 15-16 hours. And for a third of those, they’ll be asleep.
     But we’ll be ready. From my point of view, it seems more like we’re getting ready for something akin to the pope’s recent visit to D.C.
     Without the security.
     You know how it is. Everyone cleans for house guests. They’ll get clean sheets and towels and a new bar of soap. I’m not talking about that sort of cleaning.
     Though I will say this, if they do look in some of those places we have cleaned, both of them have serious issues that a vacation cannot fix.
     What I’m really talking about is that we’ve been getting ready in other more let’s-re-decorate-the-house sorts of ways.
     I know it’s gonna be bad whenever she makes a duty roster. She doesn’t throw it in my face, but she does leave it clearly in view.
First, there was a list for the inside.
     We began by hanging curtains and the requisite curtain rods in the room where we watch TV. We’ve lived here nine years and I was sure we liked it as it was. Not so surprisingly, not all of us did.
     We’ve also painted the pantry door and changed its doorknob. Apparently we were going to be embarrassed by the out-of-style shiny gold finish. I’m not sure why the other cabinet doors get to stay gold-colored but they do.
     We’re looking so much better now with something called brushed nickel.
     There’s also the outside of the house. She wanted the bushes in front to be trimmed which was fine, and the garden on the side of the house to be weeded, which was not.
     We’ve also got some of those outside spotlights aimed toward the front windows which Nancy just loves. One had bitten the dust – in 2006 – and we had refrained from spending the money to replace it. Until now.
     Nancy also wanted the front door painted a different color which I had finished in the summer. But apparently the storm door didn’t match the new color all that well, though I remain convinced that is very much a matter of opinion.
     So I tried to tackle this project with a good heart, honest I did, until we discovered that they didn’t make any sort of paint that adheres to our storm door.
     There’s a solution to everything and Nancy felt like we should solve this particular one before they arrive. So now we’re priming and painting and saying bad words.
     In the backyard, our two dogs have a habit of digging holes. And I’ll be honest, there are quite a few. But we now have one less that I’ve filled in with dirt – just one, though.      And somehow she’s happy about that.
     If I were a betting man, I’d risk a salary and a half gambling that neither Jane nor Buddy will step one foot into our backyard. But if they do … we are sorta ready.
     We’re not finished either. Buddy called to joke about whether or not Nancy has gone to buy her annual pot of mums yet. He knows she always buys one for each of their visits.
     “Tell her she should wait until the last minute to get it,” he laughed. “They’ll be fresher this way and you know we can’t stay there if they’re not fresh.”
     That’s why we love their visits. They’re both hysterical. They’re both down home and home spun. They’ve known what it’s like to pinch pennies. They understand us when we lament the craziness of our kids. And they understand when the craziness is our own.
     They love church like we do but understand it’s an institution full of imperfect human beings. They like dogs, Krystal hamburgers and college football.
     They get excited about a few days in the quiet of the mountains – just with each other.      And they can laugh at each other’s flaws.
     Family is always loved, and sometimes they can even be fun. The cleaning’s not, but the family is. They’ll be here tonight; come join us, it’ll be a blast. Just don’t trip on the mums.
     Dear God – Family is one of the hardest concepts on the planet. We love them the most, so why do we let some of them get away from us? Can anyone explain it? Anyone here, I mean? Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘This Gospel’s not about wages’
By George Valadie
September 26 , 2008
     Just last week we celebrated a school-wide Mass as part of our homecoming tradition.
     It’s a bit of a chaotic arrangement, because like many Catholic schools, we have to use our gym to fit everyone in. One moment we’re using it as a prayer space for the sacrifice of the liturgy, only hours later it hosts the insanity of a pep rally.
     Out of one-thousand teenagers, I can’t say for sure but there’s a prettygood chance that at least a few allowed themselves to get distracted, at least for some portion of the hour.
     Thankfully, our teenagers are especially well-behaved given the rock hard bleachers, but I won’t ever vouch for all of them being especially focused. In what     I’ll referto as a bit of a “Call to Worship” just before we began, I reminded them that minds can roam and thoughts can wander. Stay here if you can.
     Just three days later, in our parish church, without a single basketball goal or pep club sign to distract me, I failed to heed my own advice. On a Sunday morning, my mind roamed and my thoughts wandered. Yes, I was there, but not all of me.
     Figuratively speaking, I left not long after the Gospel.
     You remember the one. It included that always-hard-to-agree-with parable about the land owner who paid all the workers the same wage, no matter how      long they had labored.
     He had promised nothing more than a “just wage.” But when he paid equal sums for unequal hours, thus began the much-to-be-expected whining from the day-long laborers. And to be honest, from me too.
     Didn’t seem fair to me either. It never has and I’ve heard that parable for quite a few years now. But each time I can’t help thinking that several of those poor workers seemed to be getting the raw end of that deal.
     And don’t you just hate that part when the owner fires back on them with      “What? Did I cheat you? We made a deal, I paid up. Are you mad because I’m generous?”
     It makes them look petty. And it makes me feel that way, too. Because, I’m — well, I guess I can be petty too. I just don’t like having it pointed out. Not even by God.
     So it was somewhere right after that excerpt of Scripture when my brain left the sanctuary.
     As fast as the mind can travel, I was suddenly sitting in my office, remembering my job and appreciating the landowner’s point of view. Thinking about the many people who have worked for me through the years.
     Among many things, my job means I must pay each of them. Deciding people’s salaries is relatively simple when you rely on a predetermined scale. But set amounts don’t exist for everything. And I’m not sure they should.
     Should every coach make the same? Should every Key Club sponsor earn an equal sized stipend? For that matter, does every teacher really put forth equal quality work? Equal effort? Do they have the same passion? Do they all even love kids the same?
     And what exactly is a just wage? Is it the same as a fair wage? Does it mean everyone and everything has to be equal to be fair? In this office, I’ve never thought so.
     And – if I ever decided to help one poor struggling teacher more than another – would that be so horribly wrong?
     Just as quickly as my brain had arrived in my office, I was swept away to our living room of several years ago. There sat three daughters arguing about who in their teenage years had gotten to drive the best car and who had been forced to drive the worst. Not to mention the debating, re-living and re-hashing of “You never wore the re-cycled dresses; I always got those, you always got the new ones.”
     Some of that is true. What could we say? Fair is not equal. All of them can quote it, but none of them agree with it.
     Floating through time and space, I arrived back in my pew just in time to get the real point.
     This Gospel’s not about wages or cars or dresses. It’s about heaven and hell and who gets to go where. And more importantly, who gets to decide. And it’s not me.
     Left to us, it would likely be a much different crowd who walks through the doors of eternal happiness.
     Be honest. Do we think it’s really “just” that we live a life of goodness only to find ourselves in the same heaven with all those who lived a life of sin? Will it be fair that someone gets to “see the light” only hours before they actually see the light?
     Should these people get to go to heaven too? With all of us. I’m being petty again, aren’t I? Maybe even presumptuous.
     In one moment I was off somewhere agreeing with the perspective of the generous landowner, the God who gets to decide who and what and how much.      Yet, in another split second, I was finding him not only unfair but just wrong.
     And there it is. I guess I’m one of the reasons that parable was written. Me – maybe you – all of us seeing the world with our human “fair is equal” eyes. Thank      God – he’s the landowner and we just work there!
Dear God – In our saner moments, we know that Father knows best. We just need to pray for more of those. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Young mind ‘a very scary place’
By George Valadie
September 12 , 2008
    I’ll be honest. I wasn’t planning to watch one bit of the Olympics. But I did and I watched a lot.
    It wasn’t the swimming, the gymnastics, the Redeem Team or even the beach volleyball uniforms. I’m even more shallow than that. As goofy as it sounds, the only reason I got into it at all was my daughter’s boyfriend’s high-definition TV.
    From the opening moment on the opening night, I was amazed. Not just at the picture, but all that was being pictured. I was struck by the incredible – yes, that’s the right word — the unbelievable synchronization of those Chinese performers.
    It went far beyond two high divers trying to impress the judges. They offered the precision of a thousand people which impressed millions more. Honestly, I struggle to get all our seniors lined up in the same place at the same time to march in for their graduation.     These people took my breath away.
    And before that first evening was complete, I was cheering for the little nine-year-old     Chinese guy who marched in at the front of their country’s delegation.
    Perhaps you heard his story. He was a student inside one of their public schools that collapsed in the country’s deadly spring earthquakes. How does a country lose 70,000 of its people and ever recover? 70,000 humans.
    The boy found himself under block and brick, buried with the desks and the dead. But he crawled out to safety, then turned right around and climbed back in. Climbed IN to the rubble to look for any classmates he could possibly help. This kid is just nine.
    When he was asked why he would have done such a thing, he said, “I’m the hall monitor, that’s my job.” That got me started and I was hooked for the next two weeks.
    And boy, I got into it. I cheered for every one of our teams that I watched. I got teary eyed when our medal winners won and sometimes when our losers lost. And I even wished – but only momentarily – that I could have had the discipline to have trained my body like they have done.
    But the Olympics also taught me about the Chinese government and a little bit about us. And not all of it was as good.
    There were all the rumors of the gymnasts who were impressive enough, but maybe not old enough. There was the usual list of winners who were stripped of their medals because they had a heart but they also had illegal drugs flowing through it.
    And there were all the stories of how the host nation was able to put on such an impressive display. Foreign protesters were denied visas. Native protesters were required to file a permit and then arrested for doing so. And the awesome opening night display came after a 51-hour dress rehearsal, 51 consecutive hours.
    But it’s all over now and we’re back to doing what we do. So wouldn’t it be great if somehow this year proved to be an Olympic medal-winning sort of school year for the children in your life. I mean without the cheating, the jail time and the illegal drugs.
    I’m not so much talking about the academic part of school, though that is the most important part. I’m talking more about the rest of the stuff that makes up their year … friends and activities, the lunch table they choose, the birthday parties that choose them.     Isn’t it always the unimportant stuff that seems to matter most?
    The young mind is a very scary place. Students, especially as they get older, begin to worry about how they look and how they sound. Some get the school stuff easily but don’t want peers to know it. Others struggle to get it but don’t want anyone to know that.     Some get it and brag; some don’t — but they brag too.
    Mostly, they just try to fit in. Except the hole they’re trying to fit in is ever changing, ever evolving, a moving target made more difficult because well, first of all, there is no real hole.     But they think there is. So they keep trying to be whatever that is.
    To make matters worse, it’s not a hole of their own making. Other kids – and us parents — shape it, mold it, decide who and what and how.
    Perhaps most challenging of all, they think it keeps moving. But it’s not the hole that ever moves … it’s our kids who — no matter what we say — think it keeps moving. (I told you it was scary in there.)
    I can’t help but think of Michael Phelps, not the Olympic superstar, but the big-eared kid with ADHD who couldn’t get it together. The one they made fun of. How popular was he back then?
    Or worse, how would you like to be Yang Peiyi? She’s the seven-year-old the Chinese government more or less publicly declared wasn’t cute enough to be on TV. They loved a little piece of her, just not the crooked teeth and a pudgy face. If her own government insulted her looks, imagine what her classmates might do.
    I suppose the bottom line is that no school year and no kid is perfect. Not mine, not yours, not theirs. Not the cool kids, not the smart kids, not the all-time Olympic medal-winner nor the kid whose voice was chosen to represent 1.5 billion people. On the largest world stage imaginable.
    So we parents are left doing what it is we do. Helping them be who God wants them to be. And no one else.
    Dear God – The world comes together on occasion to shake hands with the defeated, not to bury them. Please grant us many more days like that. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘We’re there for each other’
By George Valadie
August 22 , 2008
     Well, I’ve discovered one really good thing.
     I know she can’t live without me … I think. At least not as long as the planet has bugs and frogs and stuff.
     Recently, I had the opportunity to attend a week-long out-of-town conference at my old alma mater. I had been telling Nancy I really needed to go; but she knew it was more that      I really wanted to go.
     I wasn’t actually lying but she does know me pretty well.
     Honestly, in our 31 years of marriage, we haven’t spent that many days or nights away from each other. Our careers have never caused either one of us to live that travelling sort of life.
     We do it some, but when the daily household chores were divided, I got bug duty. And I was gone.
     While I was away, we spoke daily. I told her about the 81-degree days and the even-cooler nights. She kept me in the loop about school happenings, our daughters and the latest antics of our two dogs.
     And then one evening, not too long after we had said our good-nights and I-love-yous, I answered my cellphone to hear her screaming. Literally. That will make your heart stop.
    “There’s a fro-o-o-o-o-o-o-g.” It was hard for me to make out just what she was saying at 500 decibels, but the standard English, normal volume translation is “frog.”
    “Did you say there’s a frog, honey?”
    “Y-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-s-s-s-s!”
    “Did it come in the house, honey?”
    “No-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o! It’s on the patio-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o!”
    “Is it trying to come in the house, honey?”
    “No-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o! It’s dea-ea-ea-ea-ea-d-d-d-d-d-d-d!”
    “If it’s dead, then what’s the problem, honey?”
    “The do-o-o-o-o-o-o-g-g-s-s are trying to bring it i-i-i-i-i-n-n-n the hou-ou-ou-ou-ou-s-s-s-s-e! To ea-ea-ea-ea-ea-t-t-t-t-t it-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t!”
     If you’re having trouble staying with this conversation, that’s sorta where I was. Only she was making her point with 9-1-1 intensity.
     Looking back now with the advantage of much clearer hindsight, I think I made my biggest mistake when I chuckled a little bit. Or it could have been all the “honeys” weren’t helping. Or perhaps when I offered this tidbit of long-distance advice, “Honey, you’re just going to have to buck up.”
     No matter, it was quickly apparent I had made a mistake of some significant magnitude.
     To which she replied, “I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I ha-a-a-a-a-a-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-e-e-e-e-e you-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u!”
     Loud or not, I heard all of that absolutely perfectly.
     Still I hated to end the conversation – or our marriage — that way. So I mistakenly offered yet another dose of what I thought were very practical suggestions and handy tips.
     She followed with, “You’ve left me in this jungle. Goo-oo-oo-oo-oo-d-d-d-d Bye-e-e-e-e-e-e-e!!!”
     Just to be clear, the jungle to which she was referring was our neighborhood. This is the same house she didn’t want to buy several years ago because there were no trees anywhere in sight.
     Thankfully, she called back just a few minutes later with the problem resolved. The marriage was tenuous, but the problem was resolved.
     She relayed all the gory details. She had fought off our two puppies. Singlehandedly, and with extreme bravery, she had scooped up the deceased frog with our puppy pooper-scooper (my idea). And then, venturing into the backyard portion of the “forest,” she tossed it.
     At the time, I couldn’t tell if she had tossed the frog or the $14.99 scooper, but I knew better than to ask. It was clear though that the frog was still intact, still dead, over our fence, and into someone else’s unsuspecting world.
     Nancy does a lot of great things, but she doesn’t do spiders, lizards, little bugs, big bugs, or apparently frogs. Never has. And that’s OK. It gives me hope for a long life together.
     It’s how we make it through.
     It’s how we all make it through, isn’t it?
     Through life, through stuff, through things, bumps, bruises, and hard times. We all make it through with and because of others. We have people to pick us up (or the frogs) when we’re struggling.
     But sometimes, they can’t. On those occasions, it’s them being in our hearts and minds with nothing but their encouraging words or prayers because sometimes the realities of life mean no one can be there for us — except us.
     As humans, we know the truth. We will not and cannot make it very far – or very well — without someone. It’s why he put two of us in the Garden.
     We’re there for each other.
     At least we ought to be.
     Dear God – Most of the time, it’s not that easy. People need us for far more than that. They need our strength when they have none. Please help us share the best of who we are. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘And now she’s rubbing it in. Mercilessly’
By George Valadie
July 25 , 2008
    My wife is a wonderful woman, a devoted and loving wife and mother, a dedicated, professional employee but honestly, she’s been kinda hard to live with lately. Rubbing it in at most every turn. If she were bragging about anything I just listed, she’d be entitled. But not about this. This travesty of justice.
    There can’t be many families who haven’t been bitten by some aspect of the current economic stress. And of course sitting at the top of the predatory food chain is the gluttonous gobbling being done by gas, food and almost any other price on the market.
    At our home, we’re blessed. And believe me, I know it. Yes, we’ve had to cut back. But we haven’t lost our house or our car. We still got to go on a bit of a vacation. Our fridge isn’t empty. We’re not frantic yet.
    But some are. In addition to an increase in prices, our society has seen a parallel increase in folks who aren’t just distressed, they’re desperate. And they’ve decided there’s only one way to solve their problems.
    Illegally. Shoplifting and stealing – people’s stuff or their identities or both. And we have not been immune.
    Not that long ago, Nancy stopped at a convenience store to pump some gas. She stepped outside her car, used her card, but never went inside. And amazingly, while she was watching the dollar dials roll by, someone reached through our open passenger side window and swiped her wallet from the front seat.
    She was on one side of our car, the thief on the other. She was spending our money, they were stealing it.
    So recently, even though we’ve been talking about doing it for years, we decided to research our credit history and credit scores. Who knows if some unknown someone had messed it up?
    And now she’s rubbing it in. Mercilessly.
    In our 31 years of married life, I can’t recall having purchased a single major item that we don’t co-own. The house is in our names, the cars are in our names, the college loans for our kids are in our names. But still we were advised to check each of our histories separately.
    I was stunned. Thankfully, there wasn’t anything listed we hadn’t put there ourselves.     We own it all. But it turns out we not only have different credit histories, we have different credit scores and – this is the very worst part – hers is better than mine. And she’s rubbing it in.
    I’m not sure how this happened really. Apparently I got stuck with the big ticket items and her credit is responsible for a $79 weedeater we bought four years ago with our Lowe’s card.
    It’s not fair. It’s not right. I would protest except I have an irrational fear of credit bureaus. Honestly though, I wouldn’t care nearly as much if she wouldn’t keep rubbing it in.
    Me: “Honey, look at that bumper sticker on the back of that car over there.” Her: “I can’t see what it says.” “Really, even with your glasses?” “No, but my credit score is better than yours!”
    “Honey, do you know what happened to that cash that was by my wallet?” “Yes, I spent it.” “You took all of it?” “Yes, my credit score is better than yours.”
    “Honey, do you want to watch the Cardinals or the British Open?” “How about the Lifetime channel?” “Are you kidding me?” “No, my credit score is better than yours.”
    You get the idea. It’s been that way ever since.
    I will say surveying our credit history was like strolling backward through time. There were memories of our first home, our first new car, my first teacher’s salary.
    There were two babies when we had very little and a third who came along later when we were doing better and had a little more little.
    There was the stuff of our young married lives, little pieces of our youth we thought we just had to have at the time. All gone from our lives now — the irrelevant, the unimportant, the desires of the immature.
    But it wasn’t all like that. Some were much wiser choices, such as when we dug in deep to provide for our children, especially their education. Nancy even stayed at home with our babies – I recall those days so well – when she likely had no credit rating at all.
    No matter the sorts of choices that we parents make, who hasn’t sacrificed for our kids?     Less savings, fewer vacations, down-sized retirement. I’m OK with all of it, and I wouldn’t want a single dollar of it back.
    Today, years later, our children are grown up and moved out. Our home is much too empty and far too quiet. And in a story that’s directly related, our financial world is back to right-side-up.
    But I have to admit those early days seemed like a lot more fun. More stressful, but more fun. And with Nancy’s new score thrown in my face, well, they now qualify as the good ole days.
    Dear God – Some have lost their homes, others their cars; some can’t feed families, some can’t feed themselves. They’re the ones who need our prayers – and you – the most. Today. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

`Let’s pray for them all’
By George Valadie
June 27 , 2008
     Gloucester, Massachusetts.
    My guess is I don’t have to say much more than that and you already have a sense of where this might be headed.
    You’ve no doubt heard the news stories coming from this heretofore mostly unknown oceanside fishing town of 30,000. They’re learning what it’s like to be deluged with the tsunami-sized waves of unflattering national media attention.
    TIME magazine was the first to report the story of 17 girls (now 18), most ages 15-16, who all became pregnant through the course of the past school year.
    That by itself ought to be enough to get most folks’ attention. But the uproar seems to be much more focused on reports some of these girls agreed to get pregnant together. Or maybe “be pregnant” together. Or at least “raise children” together.
    And I’ll admit it, that’s exactly what caused me to read on. (From my own experience, I’m amazed that many teenage girls could agree on much of anything.)
    There is any number of interesting facets to the entire story. This was four times the school’s annual average. The area’s citizenry is predominately of the Catholic faith. The public school they attend offers pregnancy testing. More than a few had displayed noticeable dismay when previous tests proved negative.
    The same school offers a daycare for any girls who are trying to be both mother and student. Not one of these 18 dropped out of school. Thus far, none plan to. Many of the fathers-to-be are not fellow students, including one now very famous homeless 24-year-old. The list goes on.
    The headline was crazy. The details make it more so.
    These young girls – and they are nothing more than girls – face a difficult and sizeable chunk of their upcoming lives without the benefit of a husband to make the task easier.     Not that they should make a new pact to find one of those.
    If it “takes a village” to raise a child, and it often does, starting with just one more person would be a plus. And these kids don’t even have that. In addition to not having a partner to love and cherish, there’s also no one there to help with the practical things – paying the bills, feeding the baby, stopping the tears, hers and her baby’s.
    Yes, single parents tackle it all the time and with incredible and amazing successes. And some did jump in when they were but 15 years old, but the odds aren’t all that good.
    Though there are days when you won’t find anyone in my own house to back me up, I like to think my kids and my wife have had a better shot because there were two of us.
    In the principal world, I’ve known several young ladies who have faced pregnancy while still in our school. It’s a challenge for everyone. Once you’ve moved past the emotions of her and her family, you then have to tackle those of everyone else, a lot of everyone elses.
    Thankfully, every Catholic school with which I’ve ever been associated expects these young people will stay in school, our school. But not everyone sees it that way.
    “Just kick her out. Can’t you make her study at home? You’re not gonna let her win any awards, are you? She’s going to look stupid in that cap and gown, you should tell her that.”
    And yes, I’ve worried about the mother-to-be and all she will likely endure from those classmates who won’t even try to silence their disapproval. And yes, I’ve prayed about what might happen to that unborn child if our school can’t find a way.
    Lastly and most importantly, I’m a dad and I hurt for those little girls, and for their moms and dads. It’s not hard to imagine how dramatically all of their lives will soon change – forever. And it’s not hard to imagine how each of these fathers and mothers is questioning themselves. That’s what I’d be doing.
    Take that, you horrible moms and dads. Why didn’t you love your children any better than that?
    Maybe there’s some truth to that. Some parents just aren’t very good at it. But all 18 teenagers? As many as 36 parents? I’m not buying that. For sure, something went awry.     But throwing parents under the bus isn’t fair.
    There were bad decisions everywhere, enough to last them a lifetime. Well actually, they will. So let’s pray for all of them.
    Dear God – How often do we mess things up and then turn to you to bail us out? You don’t always fix it all but you do always hear it all. Please help us give you less to listen to. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Gotta love my wife for trying’
By George Valadie
May 30 , 2008
     How do I say this politely – and smartly. How about – my wife is a control freak. OK, maybe that’s not so smart. And maybe she’s not quite that extreme.
     But there’s no question Nancy has some control issues. It took a few decades of marriage and family life before we dared bring it up, but now we can talk and laugh about it openly, though carefully.
     She’s on my mind because we recently spent eight hours in the car together. And among the many topics we discussed, one was our eventual retirement. Or should I say our hoped-for eventual retirement.
     I acknowledge we lack some of the fine-tuned details for our plan. Actually, we lack most of the details; and none of the ones we do have are tuned much at all. And it’s the she-can’t-make-it-happen-her-way thing that’s bothering her.
     We have some close friends who talked for years about their plan. They knew the state where they wanted to move and the lake they wanted to overlook, the porch where they wanted to sit and the sort of house they wanted attached to that porch. And today, that’s exactly what they’ve built and where they sit.
     You could say our own plan is a bit up in the air. We used to talk about a downtown condo where we could walk everywhere. But now we dream of acreage where our dogs can run everywhere. Not that it matters, neither us nor the dogs have a nickel.
     But she’s always been locked in to one very unshakeable part of this plan. She hopes for – no, she’s very much expecting we’ll all end up in the same city.
     Imagine that. Thinking the two of us, all three of our daughters and their families would all move to the same city to be there for our retirement years. A city, I might add, where not any of us currently resides.
     And that was the car-ride topic of her most recent uncontrolled – and uncontrollable – issue. “I can’t believe they’re going to mess up my plan. I don’t think one of them is going to cooperate. I used to think that, but not now.”
     By “used to,” she means when they were still wee ones and used to say things like “Mommy, we love you, we’re going to live with you forever. We hate boys.”
     Over the years, she’s tried to control other aspects of their lives – with equal non-success. She’s wanted all of their boyfriends to be perfect, and they haven’t. She’s wanted all of their degrees to be earned in four years, and they weren’t.
     And she’s wanted each of them to be independent women who marry independent men who somehow mutually and miraculously agree to live, work and bear children in the specific place and timeframe Nancy desires. And I’m pretty sure they won’t.
     But the truth of it all exists on a much different level. She doesn’t just worry about them. And she doesn’t have any real desire to control them. But she most definitely is bothered that she can’t save them. Not from the pain of a broken heart, a failed class, or those bad decisions that reap even worse results.
     It’s not all about our daughters though. On occasion, she’s suggested my shirts haven’t matched my ties, my ties haven’t matched my suits and my suits haven’t matched the occasion. Not too long ago, I had enough. And I told her that. Sort of.
     “OK, dear, that’s it. You try to control everything. You know you do. And I’m tired of it. I’m taking charge from here on. I’m exerting my manhood. And you’ll just have to get used to it. So, will you please make me a list of the few things you’d be OK with me controlling.”
     There’s a huge difference between actually controlling people’s lives, an overbearing and demeaning trait which she knows nothing about, and a mom who wishes she could help make her children happier.
     There’s a huge difference between people who ruin others’ lives for their own gratification and those who just hope for others to have better because they know there’s a better to be had.
     There’s a difference between watching power go awry and watching children go away.      And recalling all too well how much you couldn’t wait to do the very same thing.
     Nancy’s never really wanted to micro-manage them, however, she does want control of the bad stuff that awaits them. Nor does she want control of me, … well, yes she does.
     How many parents want the exact same thing. At this time of year, how many moms and dads are saying good-bye to one phase of their kids’ lives and hello to the unknown that awaits them next.
     There are kindergarteners moving on to the big bad world of grade school; eighth graders simultaneously facing high school and teenage hormones; and high school grads moving into a dorm perhaps never to return.
     And for every kid looking forward to and excited about skipping through the land mines ahead, there are twice that many parents who would gladly go first – or instead. Or who wish they could at least suggest, if not direct, each step along the way.
     My wife has control issues and a family – and she can’t control either one. But you gotta love her for trying.
     Dear God – We often pray for “serenity” and “courage” and “the wisdom to know the difference.”’ But we’d also prefer your timing to be on our schedule. I bet we make you laugh. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

‘Holtman, Wallace, send me resumes’
By George Valadie
May 16 , 2008
     Mallory Holtman and Liz Wallace.
    I’d like to meet them. I wish I’d taught them. I wish I could hire them. More than all of that, I wish I were like them.
    They’re my two newest heroes. Heroines, I guess. Try not to forget their names.
    Anyone who knows me well would know I really like sports. I’m a pretty big fan. They would also know I’m not any good at any of them. Not now, not ever.
Sometimes, I admit though, it’s hard to be a fan of everything that happens in this world.     These are all games played by human beings and thus subject to human foul-ups. Scandals. Poor sportsmanship. The crazy kid driven by the crazier parent. Coaches can be the craziest of all.
    I googled the phrase ‘poor sportsmanship’ and came up with 735,000 entries. Most anyone can rattle off a list of the sadness. Steroids in baseball — high school thru professional — make the big news, but it’s not unknown in the Tour de France.
    The National Basketball Association has been trying to recover from an unseemly referee and the fact their players’ sexual exploits are nightly late show fodder.
    The best team in the National Football League is suspected of videotaping against the rules. And the best player on my favorite team hasn’t played for a year because the league got tired of his being arrested. I did too.
    It’s not just the participants. NASCAR fans throw garbage at the victor when he makes his winning lap. College pep bands have been banned from travelling and suspended from playing because they no longer make music, they make fun. The organizers of the Olympics were scourged for taking bribes.
    In my own state, our high school athletic association has implemented a “mercy rule” in several different sports. When Team A gets far ahead of Team B, the clock rules are modified to make the games go faster. It’s a great idea, but made a necessity only because some coaches couldn’t restrain themselves from pounding the opposition into an embarrassing humiliation.
    And then, there’s Mallory Holtman and Liz Wallace.
    Perhaps you’ve heard. I wish I’d been there. They play softball for Central Washington University. Recently, their team was locked in a doubleheader duel with Western Oregon University. Both had a late-season shot, but neither had ever earned a spot in the NCAA tournament for Division II teams.
    In a scoreless game, Western Oregon’s Sara Tucholsky came to bat with two runners on base. For the season, she had a total of three hits.
    Surprisingly, she cracked a three-run homer, the first ever of her high school or college career. You can just picture her excitement. And you can imagine her trip around the bases, head and feet in the clouds. At least her feet were there, because she actually missed first base. That can’t happen and she knew it.
    So she turned around and headed back to make sure, her body going one way, her knee going the other. She dropped to the dirt in pain, unable to go forward, hardly able to crawl back.
    The rules of the game are simple. If her coach or teammates touch her to assist, she’s out. Substituting another player is acceptable, but the home run becomes a single because the sub must begin where the injured player finished. Either way, her first homerun would become no homerun. And that’s the moment where Mallory and Liz gave me hope.
    Both were playing defense in the field for the opposing Central Washington team. Mallory played first base, Liz was at short.
    And as the umpires and the coaches discussed the options that did exist, Mallory stepped in to offer one for the ages. “Is there anything that says our team can’t carry her around?”
    Are you kidding me! The umpire admitted nothing in the rules prohibited such. So Mallory hollered at Liz, both picked up their opponent, and all three headed toward her first homerun. Stopping at each base, they gently dipped her down so she could touch each with her good leg.
    They dropped her off at homeplate into the waiting arms of her teammates and then headed back to the field to get ready for the next batter. As a result of their Good Samaritan act, which they couldn’t have known at the time, they had hand-delivered the game winning run to the other team, eliminating any hope of their own team advancing to the playoffs.
    This wasn’t the pros — no huge budget for advance scouting. Mallory and Liz likely had no idea that Sara was a senior, a bad hitter, and had never hit a homerun. But they did it anyway.
    Best of all, they had no idea that there was any other way to handle the situation at hand. “Honestly,” Mallory said, “it’s one of those things that I hope anyone would do for me.”
    No, Mallory, they wouldn’t. But you did, and it gives me hope. That games are still good.     That competition isn’t absurd. And that what actually matters is ‘how you play the game.’
    Mallory Holtman and Liz Wallace.
    Dear God - To those to whom much has been given, much will be expected in return. And that includes your physical gifts. Thank you for each one of them, please re-send perspective, it was not included in the previous shipment. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)

Graduates: Let friends know your feelings
By George Valadie
May 2 , 2008
    My family was abuzz last week.
    Our eldest daughter got an exciting new job opportunity, and though it should have been, that wasn’t the reason. And it seems like the youngest will pull an A in her night class, but that wasn’t it either. Nancy was the target of a really nasty phone call at her job by a really insulting jerk of a human being. I came home to find her choosing between a glass of wine or a shot of blood pressure medicine but that wasn’t it either.
    We’re a much shallower family than that.
    “Grey’s Anatomy” was finally coming back to Thursday night TV for five new episodes. I could say it was all those females in the clan – but I’ll admit I’m right in there, too.
Every May, the TV networks dedicate quite a bit of their advertising time to promote their own shows. It’s that time of year when the words “Season Finale” get repeated again and again. With the best of the best, the writers find a way to leave us hanging.
    On rare occasion, we’re even blessed with a television classic. We’ve all known those few successful shows that have remained entertaining for an atypical number of years (more than one). For whatever reason, these storylines and characters have been engaging enough to have survived an ever-changing culture, our evolving taste, the flood of cable and the drought of writers’ strikes.
   &n