Home Sweet Home
We went walking today through a fizzy Friday afternoon. A light breeze blew mischievously around my husband and I as we strolled with the dog, me with my thoughts and he in a walking work meeting; one of those scenes we find ourselves in quite frequently now. There was a sense of light happiness in the air- rather like the effervescent sherbert colored fireworks our daughter drew while listening to Mozart’s A Little Night Music recently- a happiness generated by the feeling of a week well done now drawing to its close.
That’s not to say that the past days have been plain sailing in every respect. For my husband there has been the ongoing challenge of executing complex work responsibilities from the home environment and for my son the vagaries of continual online learning. This week has been particularly bumpy for our daughter. When I reflect, I realize that in some ways she will be the one who is most affected by this situation; growing up too quickly amidst a time which she cannot quite understand. Midway through the week, this being the third of homeschooling, we saw a dip in spirits and energy. Perhaps the result of one late bedtime and two nights of interrupted sleep but there were also the questions. Questions to which at present there are no clear answers. And so, as many parents must be doing, I listen, comfort and regroup as best I know how in this strange situation through which we are all blindly feeling our way.
The blessing of routine and of the fact that we are still allowed to walk unimpeded through our neighborhood streets ease the pressure tremendously. One afternoon, between a piano lesson and a particularly challenging gymnastics class, online of course, when both of us were feeling somewhat disconsolate and hemmed in, we headed out for a quick promenade. As my daughter danced amongst the trees and the happy chalk drawings, which now festoon many sidewalks here, a sense of lightness and space returned once more.
As I’ve been going about the business of each day a nagging memory has been calling me. Some years ago I read the first two volumes of The Last Lion, William Manchester’s grand biography of Winston Churchill. It is Manchester’s wonderfully evocative description of life in Victorian England that has stayed with me and in particular his remarkable exposition of the love this society had for the sanctuary of home. As he notes, the song ‘Home Sweet Home’ was the most popular song of the century. I was struck by their understanding of the power and necessity of family when it comes to raising children with sufficient moral character to carry the ancestral gods and duties forward into the next generation and to keep the fires of faith burning and the altars tended. And so in the midst of our godless age where the sacrosanct is spat upon and trodden under foot and where the souls of nations and people are either under the knife or being torn away I sit and think. I think sadly about how I move with reckless speed and rush my lines in these scenes of life’s play whose narrative arc is sufficiently short to warrant a greater degree of decorum. I resolve to learn from this time of space in between, of time out of mind and to make space for gentleness in corners currently cluttered by hurry and worry. I remember also the importance of my determination to live with the Victorian disregard for Rousseauistic delusions of intrinsic childhood goodness and to remember that home truly is sweet. Sweet with the fragrant scent of the lessons of kindness and care for others and of the imparting of the sacred concerns of shame and self respect from one generation to the next. So that when this particular episode of our global lives draws to its inevitable conclusion my husband, children and I can carry forward those fizzing notes of family into the dawning light of the clear day.
