Rope and Cordage

Dear Reader,

Undoubtedly you, together with us and with untold millions (billions?) around the world have been celebrating the birthday of one Michael Jeffrey Jordan, who turned forty-five today. You see, as classicists we will be everlastingly grateful to the man who did more than all others combined to rejuvenate the name and memory of Nike, the Greek goddess of victory—grateful enough even to pardon the attendant and irremediable propagation of the mispronunciation of her name (should be “nee-kay”). But on with the show.

Monday (February 11): From the vantage of a Sunday evening the previous Monday seems but the faintest echo of some mystical prehistory. We remember not a snap of what occurred, except that we had a Family Home Evening lesson about the Restoration. Animated by a Dantesque obsession with the number three and Lia’s repeated encouragement that he adapt his lessons to the understanding of his preliterate audience, Justin encapsulated his message into a summary triad of what was lost with the Apostasy and dispensed anew with the Restoration: (1) The Truth, (2) The Priesthood; and (3) The Church. Lia, cheerleader extraordinaire manqué, quickly turned this trio into a merry chant, in which Julia and Eli joined enthusiastically and rhythmically: “The Truth, the Priesthood, the Church! The Truth, the Priesthood, the Church!” The message stayed with the girls throughout the week, and from time to time they raised the chant anew in various permutations. With Julia it came out in the functionally approximate: “True, Priesthood, Church,” with the first two sounding something like a compound adjective modifying the third (“The Mormon Church, what’s that?” “Oh, it’s that true-priesthood Church with the helmet-bearing cyclist preachers.” “Gotcha.”). Eli usually said something more like, “Froof, Peasthood . . . uh . . . Froof!” In other words, both are groomed and ready, if called upon, to teach a first discussion (or is it now a lesson?).

Tuesday (February 12): Lia took dinner to Eva Allen and her newly expanded family (she and her husband, Dan, have a baby boy, Orion, as of a couple weeks) this evening. It was an adventure, punctuated by three near-wreck experiences. The roads were awful and the Bull, mischievous as ever, has a teenage boy’s fondness for skidding where respectable vehicles fear to tread. One of the near-incidents, however, was not the Bull’s fault, but rather that of a cerebrally unmotivated motorist who ran a stop sign in a snow storm. Lia was supposed to go to her Institute class after dropping off dinner but thought it best not to press her luck. She came in the house and excitedly told Justin that she had nearly had three accidents. “Three accidents?” Julia piped in. “Like how I’m three? And how there were three things at family home evening”—and here came the chant: “True, priesthood, church!”

Wednesday (February 13): Ever the counter-culturists, we celebrated Valentine’s a day early. Justin woke up before dawn and then woke up Lia, and probably our neighbors, with a hymnal serenade to the collective glories of Bachus, Venus, and San Valentino. Actually, he just woke up at his usual hour and sang his customary solo of “Nessun dorma” in the shower, but today he did so with special Valentinian fervor. His present for Lia came the previous week—a five-pack of Audrey Hepburn DVDs (we watched “Sabrina” last week, the upshot of which was that Justin spent four days pretending to be Humphrey Bogart), so duty now required only that he take Lia to dinner. Now any lovesick poet who borrows twenty dollars can take his beloved to dinner, but it is only a grandmaster of romanticism who takes his beloved to dinner in the company of a federal judge. And it is only the very page of Venus who takes his beloved to dinner in the company of a federal judge and the balance of the LDS community of the Yale Law School and their spouses. But Justin did just this, bequeathing his children to the care of a sitter before taking Lia to an unremarkable Indian restaurant where they ate with Judge Thomas Griffith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and the rest of the Yale chapter of the J. Reuben Clark Law Society. And how did the favored of Aphrodite conclude such an unforgettable date? Roses? Ice cream? A secluded garden and a volume of Keats? None of these. Instead he bid his beloved farewell and let her drive home in the rain while he dashed off to bishopric meeting. As he entered the church building Justin snapped his fingers in gleeful satisfaction. Humphrey himself could have done no better.

Thursday (February 14): After so much romantic swooning the night before, Lia confessed herself “all Valentined out,” and begged Justin to leave off further gallantries. Reluctantly, he complied, though he did cancel his Institute class for love of Lia and veneration of Venus. Lia and the girls babysat Maren Wallace at lunchtime while Maren’s parents, who had watched our girls the evening before, had a Valentine’s date of their own. Mayah and Asher Sevy were supposed to come over in the morning while the movers came to transfer their family’s effects to the seat of the federal government. Unfortunately, Mayah had a severe allergic reaction to amoxicillin, which left her body covered with lumps and her face swollen beyond recognition. She looked not a little like Rocky Balboa after fourteen rounds in the ring with Apollo Creed. Happily, Mayah is now doing much better.

Friday (February 15): But she wasn’t doing much better as of Friday morning. After being up all night with a rash whose source was as yet unidentified, Travis and Lindsay thought that perhaps taking her to Joy School would at least provide some diversion and perhaps would keep her from aggravating the rash by scratching it herself. Joy School was at the Thompsons’ today, and Lindsay called ahead to warn that our little Mayah was not recognizable as such. Kim duly sat the Joy Schoolers down and carefully explained that Mayah was sick, that she had a terrible rash, but that she was still our friend, Mayah, and we were going to try to help her be happy. Repeatedly was it stressed that there was no need to call attention to Mayah’s rash or to make her feel self-conscious about it. As the doorbell rang, Kim called out once more: “Remember: Don’t say anything about the rash!” As soon as Mayah had entered the house the Joylings flocked around her and stood agape. Elias, forgetting entirely all his mother’s injunctions of diplomacy, launched an unremitting inquisition: “Mayah, what happened to your face? Mayah, what is wrong with your face? Mayah, why does your face look like that? Mayah, why does your face not look like Mayah’s face?” And so it went. Mayah, dazed and confused, had no answers. Julia, whose heart went out to her dearest friend and who dearly wanted to be helpful, began stroking Mayah’s arm with her shirt. “Here Mayah,” she said, “I will take your rash off with my shirt.” It was ineffective, but heartwarming.

Saturday (February 16): Lia was asked earlier in the week to speak in sacrament meeting on Sunday, so on Saturday morning Justin took both girls to the church for a primary activity about missionary work. It consisted of a bewildering variety of mission-related games, competitions, role plays, etc. Julia enjoyed it all, especially a three-legged race (designed to teach the need for companionships to work together) and a vigorous round of cookie eating. Julia’s mock mission call was to Canada, Quebec. This displeased her, as she had earlier announced her firm resolve to go to “Christa.” “Oh, don’t worry,” Justin reassured her, “Christa is in Canada.” This was a dissimulation on his part; he knows nothing more of Christa than Ms. Kellie Zickler knows of Hungary (or France for that matter). But it seemed a necessary one, and Julia happily reported on returning home how much she had enjoyed her mission to Christa. Eli mostly just enjoyed running around in circles and copying Julia.

Sunday (February 17): Lia gave a powerful talk in sacrament meeting about families, taking as her text the recent Worldwide Leadership Training Broadcast on the subject of raising up a righteous posterity. She did wonderfully well, even though the transcript of the proceedings was not posted online until late Saturday night—too late to serve for purposes of preparation.

In the afternoon we stopped by a birthday open house for Adam Gustafson, one of Justin’s classmates, whose parents and some of whose siblings (he has eight) were in town for the occasion. Eli was in heaven, wandering around the food table, devouring all within her capacious reach. At one point, Justin glanced out of the corner of his eye and saw to his dismay that Eli had the cake cutter in hand and was licking it to her heart’s content. At another time Justin, engaged in lively conversation with another classmate, noted that Eli was at his feet, tugging on his pant leg and calling up anxiously, “Wake up, Daddy! Wake up!” We have no clue what she meant, but we made a speedy exit before the girls could do too much damage.

In the evening we had dinner at Kirk and Gretchen Cheney’s. Julia diverted herself by dropping Boggle pieces through the cracks in a blanket basket and by plotting in various ways how she might steal away unobserved with an Eiffel Tower paperweight. Eli tried to make havoc of their home by the smearing of her cake and the diffusion of her smell (this involved the soiling of a diaper of staggering potency). At one point, Julia asked for some juice. “Can I have juice?” she asked Lia. “No,” said she. “Why not?” complained Julia. In the midst of Lia’s explanation another, littler voice rose from the floor. “Can I have juice?” asked Eli. “No,” said a smiling Lia. “Why not?” Eli asked eagerly. If emulation is the highest praise Eli lauds Julia to the heavens. On the way home Eli was unusually silent for an unusually long period. “Are you awake?” Lia asked over her shoulder. After a pause, a little voice squeaked, “I’m asleep,” then belied itself by means of mirthful giggling.

Back at home we put the girls in their pajamas and got ready for bed. With all four of us in close quarters in the living room, Justin dropped into an impromptu rendition of, “I love Mommy she loves me, we love Julia yessiree, she loves us and so you see . . . .” Soon the whole family had joined in the merriment. All except Eli, who had scuttled into the corner, from whence she invited us to join her in her “cottage,” which consists of the small space between our glider and the wall. So we all crouched down into the corner and sang, “Families Can Be Together Forever,” with bright smiling faces (Eli sang loudest of all) and had an imaginary picnic. It was a happy moment for our, on the whole, very happy little family.