April 4, 2007

The Slipper Dance

Read: Luke 11:11-13

Mardi Gras beads ... a new box of crayons ... Happy New Year noisemakers in the middle of July ... such are some of my first and favorite memories of spending the night at Grandma’s house.

My sister and I were scared of staying anywhere – well, everywhere! – overnight. We were reluctant even at Grandpa and Grandma’s but my grandmother created a wonderful diversion for us, enticement in the form of an old cardboard box behind the couch. The magic of our “stay-all-night” box comes back to me even now some 30 years later: wooden spools for rolling, stacking, and decorating; metal cookie cutters for tracing; sewing kits, story books, paper dolls. All for fun. All for us. But only at Grandma’s house and only when we spent the night.

We ran to the contact-paper-covered box as soon as Mom was out the door, and Grandma never disappointed us with something new or something shared from inside the house. We learned to make paper chains and Christmas cards; we learned to make dolls; we learned to read books and to dance in Grandma-sized slippers; we learned to spend the night without being scared; we learned to share.

She made the box, she said when I asked as an adult, because she wanted us to be happy about visiting and wanted us to anticipate spending the night. If the process of getting us interested in the world outside our door had to start with an old box full of leftover entertainment she was fine with that. And so it is with all of us that living well and with purpose means nurturing and entertaining and loving our families and friends. It means we take care of the people smaller than us – smaller in stature, smaller in bravery, smaller in strength – by passing along some part of us that makes the world a better place. We pick up shiny things or useful things or comforting things and we offer them, in the form of gifts or words or hope, to the people we love so that they might venture out with new (or newly renewed) excitement and purpose.

There is no better gift to receive than this gift of love: that we are encouraged to learn new ways of living and enjoying life by following in other people’s footsteps . . . or by dancing in their slippers.

Jenneth Wright