What part of speech is "religious"? If you answered “adjective” you’re right, except, of course, when religious is a noun. Now remember: a religious is religious, but you can be religious without being a religious. Teaching is difficult for countless reasons, but one very time-consuming part of what I teach is that I am constantly clarifying what we mean by words that over centuries have acquired mind-boggling pluralities of meaning. Take Church: I am going to Church, that building on the corner is my Church, she’s part of my Church, I teach Church history. The more ordinary the word, the more meanings it has. Fathers of the Church, desert fathers, our Father, bless me Father for I have sinned, I have to ask my father. Eucharist is a meal, a sacrifice, a gathering, a thanksgiving. And don’t even get me started on water, the simplest of symbols used in Christian worship. Water gives us life, water kills us, water cleans us, water gets us wet. It’s confusing and comforting – the simplest things in our lives are exploding with meaning. I was talking to a colleague recently about the time my apartment was burgled, and because we both work in theology I pretty quickly turned the conversation to how a concept of sacramentality helped me deal with the loss of objects. Things are important to us. Things, like people, can be stuffed with grace. I didn’t have to feel guilty mourning the loss of things because my sacramental faith allows me to recognize their meaning. That’s what was on my mind recently when, with a wise and thoughtful group of people, the conversation turned to detachment. I get why detachment is attractive, and brilliant people have promoted it as a path to contentment, but I’m going to take a pass. Give me attachment , a passionate devotion to things, relationships, people, and life. I’ll take the pain when it comes – I’ve known grief, and it has shown me not the foolishness of my attachments but of the blazing heat of my love. Grace allows the ordinary to be transformed into the extraordinary, and gives us permission to love the thing because we love the grace. | ||||||
Showing posts with label burglary. Show all posts
Showing posts with label burglary. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Stuffed with grace
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Socks for Christmas
The Christmas after my apartment was burgled, my brother seized the opportunity to replace some of the items that had been taken. He didn’t buy me a new camera, or a new rosary ring, but hit up his college bookstore for the one thing he knew I couldn’t live without: socks.
Driven by motivations beyond the scope of this post, the burglar(s) had stolen most on my socks, and when my brother presented a new set to me with a mischievous grin after my Christmas morning gigs, I was somewhat relieved. A few days later my Godmother gave me another really nice three-pack of socks, for the same reason. Since then, I have had enough socks.
I was putting on the Fordham socks my brother gave me just the other day, and I smiled because they made me think of him. That same morning I drank my morning coffee from a mug that I had purchased when in Italy with family, and that too had made me smile because of the memories it held. When I wear a hat from my godmother, write with a pen from my father, sleep under an afghan from my grandmother, I have what I need and I have the memory and companionship of those who have provided it for me.
To be sacramental, to find God in water, oil, bread and wine, is to also find God in a pen, a pair of socks, even the set of dental picks that my mother puts in my stocking every year even though I prefer regular floss. I have great appreciation for the purposelessly beautiful – a vase of flowers, my claddagh ring – but what really moves me is the beautifully purposeful. Items I use every day are full of memories, infused with a Love beyond their evident purpose.
By virtue of the Creation & still more of the Incarnation, nothing here below is profane for those who know how to see. –Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Driven by motivations beyond the scope of this post, the burglar(s) had stolen most on my socks, and when my brother presented a new set to me with a mischievous grin after my Christmas morning gigs, I was somewhat relieved. A few days later my Godmother gave me another really nice three-pack of socks, for the same reason. Since then, I have had enough socks.
I was putting on the Fordham socks my brother gave me just the other day, and I smiled because they made me think of him. That same morning I drank my morning coffee from a mug that I had purchased when in Italy with family, and that too had made me smile because of the memories it held. When I wear a hat from my godmother, write with a pen from my father, sleep under an afghan from my grandmother, I have what I need and I have the memory and companionship of those who have provided it for me.
To be sacramental, to find God in water, oil, bread and wine, is to also find God in a pen, a pair of socks, even the set of dental picks that my mother puts in my stocking every year even though I prefer regular floss. I have great appreciation for the purposelessly beautiful – a vase of flowers, my claddagh ring – but what really moves me is the beautifully purposeful. Items I use every day are full of memories, infused with a Love beyond their evident purpose.
By virtue of the Creation & still more of the Incarnation, nothing here below is profane for those who know how to see. –Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Try, try again
My immediate family has never had a birthday present ritual. If someone sees something they like want to give someone, they buy it, and maybe give it to them on their birthday, or maybe give it to them whenever, or maybe they just buy the person a burrito the next time they see them. Because my birthday is always around Thanksgiving, I usually see my parents in the week before my birthday, and we take that as an excuse to eat cake. On my 25th birthday my mother brought out an Entertainment Book, dropped it on the kitchen table with a clatter and announced "Happy Birthday...your brother had to sell these for school".
Still, two nights ago my mother slipped into another room after dinner and returned with a familiar looking box from a local jewelry store. She handed it to me and laughed "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." When I opened it I wasn't surprised to find a gold chain with a single, small pearl.
When my apartment was broken into a few years ago all that was taken was jewelry, because that was all that I had. There were only one or two things that I truly lamented losing, and one was the little Add-a-pearl necklace I'd had since I was a girl. Most of my cousins also have them, and as birthdays and holidays passed we'd get another pearl here and there and have them added to our necklaces. Mine only had thirteen or so pearls on it (or maybe seventeen? For whatever reason I'm certain it was a prime number), and since I'd reached adulthood and passed the age of getting little gold boxes on my birthday, it seemed destined to stay at that number of pearls.
It wasn't until I realized that it was gone that I started to cry. My grandmother had been dead two decades, and I knew that the loss of this sign of her love didn't mean she loved me any less. The other wonderful women in my family, my aunts and my mother, were all still in my life - in fact, no one in my mother's large family had died since my grandmother's passing twenty years prior. Still, I was raised among sacramental people, treasuring signs and objects, and the loss of that particular object was devastating.
Not only was I raised to be sacramental, I was raised on Roman time, so it's no surprise that it took 2+ years to replace the necklace. I couldn't help but think of my mother's admonition to 'try, try again' as I heard the readings for the First Sunday of Advent (and not just because they mention a house being broken into).
Most of us are probably familiar with that quote attributed to Mother Teresa to the effect of "some jerk on the beach might knock down your sand castle - build one anyway". I worry that people are tempted to take the suggestion that "we know not the day or the hour" as an excuse to do nothing, because who knows when Christ will return and transform it all?
It's true, we don't know what's coming. I try to believe in the liberation of uncertainty. If I really don't know what's coming - when the Lord will return to us, when the bottom will fall out, when my stuff will be stolen - I am free to just build. For all we know someone could yank my necklace off my neck tomorrow - that didn't stop my mother from giving me a tangible sign of her love and our memories. My apartment could burn down tomorrow - that didn't stop me from cleaning up this afternoon. The people I love, everything I love, could be taken from me in a heartbeat - that does not stop me from loving with my whole heart every minute of the day.
We can't predict when destruction and sorrow will come for us, but we can't predict when redemption will knock on our door either. So we 'try, try again', building and rebuilding. When the unexpected comes all I can hope is that I am caught doing that which creates the world as it should be. Until we can enjoy the world as it should be, we keep trying, doing our part to increase beauty and love, clothing ourselves in the armor of light.
Still, two nights ago my mother slipped into another room after dinner and returned with a familiar looking box from a local jewelry store. She handed it to me and laughed "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." When I opened it I wasn't surprised to find a gold chain with a single, small pearl.
When my apartment was broken into a few years ago all that was taken was jewelry, because that was all that I had. There were only one or two things that I truly lamented losing, and one was the little Add-a-pearl necklace I'd had since I was a girl. Most of my cousins also have them, and as birthdays and holidays passed we'd get another pearl here and there and have them added to our necklaces. Mine only had thirteen or so pearls on it (or maybe seventeen? For whatever reason I'm certain it was a prime number), and since I'd reached adulthood and passed the age of getting little gold boxes on my birthday, it seemed destined to stay at that number of pearls.
It wasn't until I realized that it was gone that I started to cry. My grandmother had been dead two decades, and I knew that the loss of this sign of her love didn't mean she loved me any less. The other wonderful women in my family, my aunts and my mother, were all still in my life - in fact, no one in my mother's large family had died since my grandmother's passing twenty years prior. Still, I was raised among sacramental people, treasuring signs and objects, and the loss of that particular object was devastating.
Not only was I raised to be sacramental, I was raised on Roman time, so it's no surprise that it took 2+ years to replace the necklace. I couldn't help but think of my mother's admonition to 'try, try again' as I heard the readings for the First Sunday of Advent (and not just because they mention a house being broken into).
Most of us are probably familiar with that quote attributed to Mother Teresa to the effect of "some jerk on the beach might knock down your sand castle - build one anyway". I worry that people are tempted to take the suggestion that "we know not the day or the hour" as an excuse to do nothing, because who knows when Christ will return and transform it all?
It's true, we don't know what's coming. I try to believe in the liberation of uncertainty. If I really don't know what's coming - when the Lord will return to us, when the bottom will fall out, when my stuff will be stolen - I am free to just build. For all we know someone could yank my necklace off my neck tomorrow - that didn't stop my mother from giving me a tangible sign of her love and our memories. My apartment could burn down tomorrow - that didn't stop me from cleaning up this afternoon. The people I love, everything I love, could be taken from me in a heartbeat - that does not stop me from loving with my whole heart every minute of the day.
We can't predict when destruction and sorrow will come for us, but we can't predict when redemption will knock on our door either. So we 'try, try again', building and rebuilding. When the unexpected comes all I can hope is that I am caught doing that which creates the world as it should be. Until we can enjoy the world as it should be, we keep trying, doing our part to increase beauty and love, clothing ourselves in the armor of light.
Friday, September 18, 2009
A necklace
The morning of the day my apartment was broken into I decided on a whim to take off the gold cross I had worn nearly every day since I was twelve and to put on a silly star-shaped necklace instead. That evening, when I noticed that all of my jewelry was gone, my first thought was "damn, I wish I had worn a different necklace today", because all of the ones that had meaning for me were probably already melted down (along with my class ring and the handful of other items I had of any value) and I was stuck with this dumb star choker with the gold plating chipping off.
Today I put that necklace on for the first time in almost a year. In a testament to my own irrationality, every time I looked at the thing I became angry at it, as if it was the fault of that necklace that so many things that had accrued meaning and experience over time had been taken from me. I wish I could say I have gained some perspective and insight about the triviality of objects, but I haven't really. I haven't taken my claddagh ring off in a year, because if anything happened to that I would probably give in to despair.
Today I put that necklace on for the first time in almost a year. In a testament to my own irrationality, every time I looked at the thing I became angry at it, as if it was the fault of that necklace that so many things that had accrued meaning and experience over time had been taken from me. I wish I could say I have gained some perspective and insight about the triviality of objects, but I haven't really. I haven't taken my claddagh ring off in a year, because if anything happened to that I would probably give in to despair.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
The Can Lady Consortium
Any BC alum who was paying attention (or who ever set foot in the mods) is well aware of the Can Lady, who trudged around campus on Saturday and Sunday mornings retrieving our empties from bushes and sidewalks. Even the most justice-oriented undergrad (and there were plenty vying for that award) could use her activity as an opportunity to feel self-righteous about littering, of all things.
In retrospect this was probably not good for the moral development of BC's privileged students - and before you get all huffy, fellow alums, let me remind you that anyone who can go to a school like that is privileged one way or another, either with family influence, wealth, or simple academic inclination. So what if we had small Asian woman cleaning up the debris of our attempts at bacchanalia? We were doing her a favor, or at least that's what we convinced ourselves.
With due respect to my Boston College roots, there is a new can lady in my life. She lives around the corner from me and her back deck leans out over the path to my backdoor. I can remember one evening out with a friend of a friend who happened to live down the block who started talking about our charming can lady. "I give her all my empties and she calls me her angel!" the young woman effervesced. I am sure I shocked her when I started complaining about the cute old Lithuanian lady in the babushka.
In fact, I probably came off like a complete shrew. But on Tuesday night, the night before garbage day, I was repeatedly awakened through the night by her rattling through her empty bottles. I really don't know what she does on that deck with all the empties, but it involves relentless clanking all through the night. I am getting the urge to type all in enraged caps just thinking about it.
I have also seen her going through my garbage bags. I don't know which is more insulting, the violation of my private space or the insinuation that I don't recycle.
But what is most disturbing to me are all the moochers who have teamed up with her to use her space. There is a parade of people in and out of the gate next to mine, wheeling their suitcases and shopping carts up and down the street to see what they can get from our garbage. One of them sent her son who couldn't have been more than ten down the street to pick through the barrels looking for good stuff.
For what it's worth, I don't think that any member of the Can Lady Consortium is sinister enough to have been the person who burglarized the apartment last fall. I still could do without my corner being dumpster diving central.
In retrospect this was probably not good for the moral development of BC's privileged students - and before you get all huffy, fellow alums, let me remind you that anyone who can go to a school like that is privileged one way or another, either with family influence, wealth, or simple academic inclination. So what if we had small Asian woman cleaning up the debris of our attempts at bacchanalia? We were doing her a favor, or at least that's what we convinced ourselves.
With due respect to my Boston College roots, there is a new can lady in my life. She lives around the corner from me and her back deck leans out over the path to my backdoor. I can remember one evening out with a friend of a friend who happened to live down the block who started talking about our charming can lady. "I give her all my empties and she calls me her angel!" the young woman effervesced. I am sure I shocked her when I started complaining about the cute old Lithuanian lady in the babushka.
In fact, I probably came off like a complete shrew. But on Tuesday night, the night before garbage day, I was repeatedly awakened through the night by her rattling through her empty bottles. I really don't know what she does on that deck with all the empties, but it involves relentless clanking all through the night. I am getting the urge to type all in enraged caps just thinking about it.
I have also seen her going through my garbage bags. I don't know which is more insulting, the violation of my private space or the insinuation that I don't recycle.
But what is most disturbing to me are all the moochers who have teamed up with her to use her space. There is a parade of people in and out of the gate next to mine, wheeling their suitcases and shopping carts up and down the street to see what they can get from our garbage. One of them sent her son who couldn't have been more than ten down the street to pick through the barrels looking for good stuff.
For what it's worth, I don't think that any member of the Can Lady Consortium is sinister enough to have been the person who burglarized the apartment last fall. I still could do without my corner being dumpster diving central.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Gifts
In case any of you worry that I don't have anyone looking out for me in Boston, you should know that last night my landlady knocked on my door around 6pm holding two boxes. She told me she had gone through her jewelry and found a few things she never wore and wanted to give them to me because she felt bad about the burglary and wanted to help me start refilling my jewelry box. A coworker of mine had also gotten me a few bracelets when she heard that mine had been taken.
I envy those people who can just accept gifts without a second thought. I think for most of us (and especially for the particularly neurotic, like myself) there's always that tiny feeling of unworthiness, even guilt, that someone should think of you and offer you something you haven't earned.
Her visit last night reminded me of a gift she gave me when I first moved in. I had made the mistake of moving while I was in the middle of a two-week intensive summer course on The Church of the Poor with none other than Gustavo Gutierrez (SQUEE!). When she came down with a gift for me while I was writing my final paper in my haphazardly decorated new kitchen, it made such an impact on me that I included the incident in my paper. This is what I wrote at the time:
Related to our need to be open to receiving God’s assistance is our need to accept God’s gratuitous gift. Discussing the preferential option for the poor and spiritual poverty, Gutiérrez states “God first loved us. Our lives should respond to this gratuitous initiative of God” (EW 146). God loves us – and all humans – because God is good, not because we are good.
To accept gifts freely can be a challenge. As I was writing this, my landlady unexpectedly knocked on my door. I opened the door to find her bearing two sets of curtains. She told me her daughter had left them with her, they matched my kitchen, I had two kitchen windows, and I didn’t have curtains yet, so she was giving them to me. Her action was so unexpected that my thank-yous felt inadequate, and I shut the door unsettled. If it is difficult to accept free curtains, no wonder it is a challenge to accept divine love and the gift of eternal life.
But I don’t physically need curtains any more than poor Andean girls need dolls, or an adolescent Gustavo needed ice cream, or Jesus needed three hundred denarii of oil poured on his head. Yet in the Markan account of Jesus anointing by an anonymous woman (Mk 14: 3-9) Jesus chastises those who would criticize her gratuitous act. In fact, he links the proclamation of the gospel with her act.
To receive God’s love gratuitously and to know that love is not conditional upon our striving, is an act of submission, of giving up control. We find validation of this acceptance in the pericope of Jesus’ anointing, and also in the story of Creation. According to Gutiérrez, we were made in gratuity, and “to be loved gratuitously is the greatest human aspiration”.
Forgive this soprano's detour into her other life of preaching and pontificating. Can't hurt to be reminded of the free gift of love once in a while, though.
I envy those people who can just accept gifts without a second thought. I think for most of us (and especially for the particularly neurotic, like myself) there's always that tiny feeling of unworthiness, even guilt, that someone should think of you and offer you something you haven't earned.
Her visit last night reminded me of a gift she gave me when I first moved in. I had made the mistake of moving while I was in the middle of a two-week intensive summer course on The Church of the Poor with none other than Gustavo Gutierrez (SQUEE!). When she came down with a gift for me while I was writing my final paper in my haphazardly decorated new kitchen, it made such an impact on me that I included the incident in my paper. This is what I wrote at the time:
Related to our need to be open to receiving God’s assistance is our need to accept God’s gratuitous gift. Discussing the preferential option for the poor and spiritual poverty, Gutiérrez states “God first loved us. Our lives should respond to this gratuitous initiative of God” (EW 146). God loves us – and all humans – because God is good, not because we are good.
To accept gifts freely can be a challenge. As I was writing this, my landlady unexpectedly knocked on my door. I opened the door to find her bearing two sets of curtains. She told me her daughter had left them with her, they matched my kitchen, I had two kitchen windows, and I didn’t have curtains yet, so she was giving them to me. Her action was so unexpected that my thank-yous felt inadequate, and I shut the door unsettled. If it is difficult to accept free curtains, no wonder it is a challenge to accept divine love and the gift of eternal life.
But I don’t physically need curtains any more than poor Andean girls need dolls, or an adolescent Gustavo needed ice cream, or Jesus needed three hundred denarii of oil poured on his head. Yet in the Markan account of Jesus anointing by an anonymous woman (Mk 14: 3-9) Jesus chastises those who would criticize her gratuitous act. In fact, he links the proclamation of the gospel with her act.
To receive God’s love gratuitously and to know that love is not conditional upon our striving, is an act of submission, of giving up control. We find validation of this acceptance in the pericope of Jesus’ anointing, and also in the story of Creation. According to Gutiérrez, we were made in gratuity, and “to be loved gratuitously is the greatest human aspiration”.
Forgive this soprano's detour into her other life of preaching and pontificating. Can't hurt to be reminded of the free gift of love once in a while, though.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Today I went to the pawn unit to see if there were any records of the stolen items being sold or pawned. Since it has been almost 30 days since the burglary I had a bit of a time crunch because secondhand shops are only required to hold items for 30 days. So after a long day at the end of a long week, I left work early to head over to Tremont St.
The had told me on the phone that they were at 1199 Tremont St, near the Reggie Lewis Center. It occurred to me on the way over there that they were probably in the Boston Police Headquarters, but naturally there weren't any numbers on the buildings so I drove up and down the street a few times, then found a spot, passed through the metal detectors and asked if I was in the right place. Lucky for me I was.
Everyone in licensing was very pleasant, and they sat me down in a comfortable chair with piles and piles of records starting with 9/27. I pulled out my list of stolen pieces, lowered the chair so that my feet touched the floor, and started skimming. The experience was just about as miserable as I had expected (think Erin Brockovich at the water board, minus the sycophant in the plaid pants). In addition to the charts and descriptions swimming in front of my eyes, a woman was trying to change the life of one of the officers with a nearby cubicle ("you should come to church! you should eat fruit! you should pack a lunch!"). As all of my senses reached a breaking point, my neck started to hurt from hovering over the sheets of records.
There were a few redeeming moments. None of them involved finding any of my lost things, but there were some wild items listed. Some were amusing in themselves- a Patriots helmet gold necklace for instance - and some were purely the result of transcription. These included a Hairing Bone chain, a Cladder ring, and a Bango bracelet.
Lest you think my experience was all mocking superiority and bad posture, I will add that I got a little emotional when I got deep into October's records and accepted that nothing was going to show up. I had been trying so hard to remember my jewelry in order to describe it, and the pieces were all very present in my mind. Letting them go again this afternoon I found myself crying over those long sheets of white paper, wondering if it would be better to catch the tears in my glasses or let them drip onto the BPD's records.
The had told me on the phone that they were at 1199 Tremont St, near the Reggie Lewis Center. It occurred to me on the way over there that they were probably in the Boston Police Headquarters, but naturally there weren't any numbers on the buildings so I drove up and down the street a few times, then found a spot, passed through the metal detectors and asked if I was in the right place. Lucky for me I was.
Everyone in licensing was very pleasant, and they sat me down in a comfortable chair with piles and piles of records starting with 9/27. I pulled out my list of stolen pieces, lowered the chair so that my feet touched the floor, and started skimming. The experience was just about as miserable as I had expected (think Erin Brockovich at the water board, minus the sycophant in the plaid pants). In addition to the charts and descriptions swimming in front of my eyes, a woman was trying to change the life of one of the officers with a nearby cubicle ("you should come to church! you should eat fruit! you should pack a lunch!"). As all of my senses reached a breaking point, my neck started to hurt from hovering over the sheets of records.
There were a few redeeming moments. None of them involved finding any of my lost things, but there were some wild items listed. Some were amusing in themselves- a Patriots helmet gold necklace for instance - and some were purely the result of transcription. These included a Hairing Bone chain, a Cladder ring, and a Bango bracelet.
Lest you think my experience was all mocking superiority and bad posture, I will add that I got a little emotional when I got deep into October's records and accepted that nothing was going to show up. I had been trying so hard to remember my jewelry in order to describe it, and the pieces were all very present in my mind. Letting them go again this afternoon I found myself crying over those long sheets of white paper, wondering if it would be better to catch the tears in my glasses or let them drip onto the BPD's records.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Sock it to me!
I promise that soon this blog will stop being all woe-is-me-I-got-burgled and start being about all the different ways I make a mess of my life, like usual.
This post falls somewhere in between, because it’s really not the burglar’s fault that I can’t find my toenail clippers. Regardless of any culpability, this missing item resulted in my toes finally poking through a pair of favorite striped socks which are at least 10 years old. This, of course, happened at rehearsal when I really couldn’t put my shoes back on.
I try to repair socks because I hate being a “Waste-e-roo”, but with how busy my life is these days, I’m not too inclined to add anything to my darning pile. Unfortunately I don’t see much of a choice in the matter because apparently when thieves steal jewelry they put it in your socks to take it out.
When the detectives were here, marveling at how my apartment had been ransacked (I had to fess up that it had been that messy when I left in the morning) they asked if anything else was gone. I said “I must be imagining this, but I think they took my socks”. They were the ones who filled me in on the thievery technique.
This post falls somewhere in between, because it’s really not the burglar’s fault that I can’t find my toenail clippers. Regardless of any culpability, this missing item resulted in my toes finally poking through a pair of favorite striped socks which are at least 10 years old. This, of course, happened at rehearsal when I really couldn’t put my shoes back on.
I try to repair socks because I hate being a “Waste-e-roo”, but with how busy my life is these days, I’m not too inclined to add anything to my darning pile. Unfortunately I don’t see much of a choice in the matter because apparently when thieves steal jewelry they put it in your socks to take it out.
When the detectives were here, marveling at how my apartment had been ransacked (I had to fess up that it had been that messy when I left in the morning) they asked if anything else was gone. I said “I must be imagining this, but I think they took my socks”. They were the ones who filled me in on the thievery technique.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
This post brought to you by Mark Twain
N O T I C E.
To the next burglar‒‒‒‒
To the next burglar‒‒‒‒
There is nothing but plated ware in this house, now and henceforth. You will find it in that brass thing in the dining room over in the corner by the basket of kittens. If you want the basket, put the kittens in the brass thing. Do not make a noise—it disturbs the family. You will find rubbers in the front hall, by that thing which has the umbrellas in it, chiffonier, I think they call it, or pergola, or something like that.
Please close the door when you go away.
Very truly yours,
S. L. Clemens.
******************************************
Not only is it appropriate, it gives me a chance to brag about famous people from Connecticut.
Monday, September 29, 2008
more news from the crime scene
The first time that I went to Europe was in the summer of 2000 when I spent three weeks in Parma studying Italian. I returned shortly after that to go to Rome, and kept lira in my wallet for a long time after that as a reminder that I wanted to go back to Europe as soon as possible. In a biting instance of dramatic irony, you all know that lira are worthless now as Italy has switched to the Euro, so I had put my pretty little lira in a tin that read “Baseball: America’s Favorite Pastime” into which I also tossed pennies and Euros. I discovered yesterday that was taken in the theft also. Did the thief know that my brother gave me that tin?
Everyone keeps saying “You are handling this so well!”, but I don’t really know how I am supposed to handle it, or how they expected me to handle it. I cry about once a day over losing my Add-A-Pearl necklace, and I was a little creeped out to discover that all of my clean cloth rags had been put in the bin labeled ‘dirty’ and vice versa. Other than that, I haven’t had much emotional turbulence about the whole thing. Until yesterday that is…
Just before I was about to embark on my training run I realized that the radio I use when I run had been taken. That’s right, I listen to a Sony Walkman radio when I go running, and I hope the fact that it attaches to an armband makes other runners think it’s an Ipod. It cost about $40, and that creep who broke into my house took it. Congratulations, you’re just a jerk for stealing something that is worth next to nothing, the theft of which only serves to inconvenience me, not benefit you. That, combined with my recent discovery that my chapstick was also stolen because it was in the top of my jewelry box, set me off, and I screamed and shouted alone in my apartment. Then I went to Target and bought a new radio and chapstick.
Everyone keeps saying “You are handling this so well!”, but I don’t really know how I am supposed to handle it, or how they expected me to handle it. I cry about once a day over losing my Add-A-Pearl necklace, and I was a little creeped out to discover that all of my clean cloth rags had been put in the bin labeled ‘dirty’ and vice versa. Other than that, I haven’t had much emotional turbulence about the whole thing. Until yesterday that is…
Just before I was about to embark on my training run I realized that the radio I use when I run had been taken. That’s right, I listen to a Sony Walkman radio when I go running, and I hope the fact that it attaches to an armband makes other runners think it’s an Ipod. It cost about $40, and that creep who broke into my house took it. Congratulations, you’re just a jerk for stealing something that is worth next to nothing, the theft of which only serves to inconvenience me, not benefit you. That, combined with my recent discovery that my chapstick was also stolen because it was in the top of my jewelry box, set me off, and I screamed and shouted alone in my apartment. Then I went to Target and bought a new radio and chapstick.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
last night
Usually I can think of a clever zinger or hook to start these things, but for some reason today one is eluding me. So let’s start with the headline: Religion Teacher’s Apartment Burglarized: Only Losses are Gifts from Dead People.
I can only imagine how disappointed our intrepid thief was as he or she rifled through old shoeboxes filled with cards from my mom, old pairs of glasses, stacks of headshots, useless keys. Searching for ipods and flatscreens, what he or she found were an old “boom box” and a 15 year old TV with bunny ears.
So what do you take from the girl who has very little? The handful of jewelry she keeps on top of her dresser. They’re just things, I keep telling myself. But there are reasons we become attached to things. They remind us of people who gave them to us, of times in our lives, of memories. The only jewelry I had were items that had been with me for what feels like forever.
That silly red box (on top of a piece of furniture which is worth more money than anything else in the house) held the Christmas morning I got my cross in my stocking and the 10 years that I wore it every day. It held my high school ring dance, and the weeks of having classmates turn my ring 98 times. It held a student’s parent telling me that graduation mass was the most beautiful mass she had ever attended and that she wanted to give me a thank you. It held singing at the wedding of friends (and laughing over the fact that they also gave me earrings even though my ears aren’t pierced). It held birthday after birthday of little gold boxes from Lux Bond & Green and trips to the jeweler to have the pearls added to my necklace. It held a high school friend telling me that a rosary ring had made him think of me, just before he told me it only cost a dime.
They took my camera, off of which I had already downloaded the pictures from Italy. They took an old wallet (which they probably thought was a big score – hope they enjoy my DSW Rewards Card).
What initially tipped me off that the unlocked door wasn’t a random thing was that I couldn’t find my phone charger. I have been using a hand-me-down phone with a weak battery, so I knew I would have to go back to using the cheap Best Buy phone I had been using before. Except they took that phone (which explains why they took the charger). Way to go dummy, now you have a $15 phone and a charger that doesn’t go with it. Thanks for ruining my day.
The officers who came were very nice and told me where the local pawn shops are. When I told them that I had renters insurance they were astonished. Apparently no one they ask ever has it. I called the family to commiserate (sorry to upset you guys so late at night!) At that point I needed to hit the hay. I don’t know what made me think that I would just be able to go to sleep, but half an hour later I was still wide-eyed and shaking. I’ll blame it on the cold.
So I got up and watched Conan. And rifled through all of my drawers to make sure my passport and old credit card were still there. They were.
I can only imagine how disappointed our intrepid thief was as he or she rifled through old shoeboxes filled with cards from my mom, old pairs of glasses, stacks of headshots, useless keys. Searching for ipods and flatscreens, what he or she found were an old “boom box” and a 15 year old TV with bunny ears.
So what do you take from the girl who has very little? The handful of jewelry she keeps on top of her dresser. They’re just things, I keep telling myself. But there are reasons we become attached to things. They remind us of people who gave them to us, of times in our lives, of memories. The only jewelry I had were items that had been with me for what feels like forever.
That silly red box (on top of a piece of furniture which is worth more money than anything else in the house) held the Christmas morning I got my cross in my stocking and the 10 years that I wore it every day. It held my high school ring dance, and the weeks of having classmates turn my ring 98 times. It held a student’s parent telling me that graduation mass was the most beautiful mass she had ever attended and that she wanted to give me a thank you. It held singing at the wedding of friends (and laughing over the fact that they also gave me earrings even though my ears aren’t pierced). It held birthday after birthday of little gold boxes from Lux Bond & Green and trips to the jeweler to have the pearls added to my necklace. It held a high school friend telling me that a rosary ring had made him think of me, just before he told me it only cost a dime.
They took my camera, off of which I had already downloaded the pictures from Italy. They took an old wallet (which they probably thought was a big score – hope they enjoy my DSW Rewards Card).
What initially tipped me off that the unlocked door wasn’t a random thing was that I couldn’t find my phone charger. I have been using a hand-me-down phone with a weak battery, so I knew I would have to go back to using the cheap Best Buy phone I had been using before. Except they took that phone (which explains why they took the charger). Way to go dummy, now you have a $15 phone and a charger that doesn’t go with it. Thanks for ruining my day.
The officers who came were very nice and told me where the local pawn shops are. When I told them that I had renters insurance they were astonished. Apparently no one they ask ever has it. I called the family to commiserate (sorry to upset you guys so late at night!) At that point I needed to hit the hay. I don’t know what made me think that I would just be able to go to sleep, but half an hour later I was still wide-eyed and shaking. I’ll blame it on the cold.
So I got up and watched Conan. And rifled through all of my drawers to make sure my passport and old credit card were still there. They were.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)