Dorrier Underwood

The Gift After the Mistake Elbow on the back of your chair Elbow formed in a V with your hands behind your head You are sitting there curious You want me to say something Besides, I made a mistake Besides, I thought you did the right thing   Besides some explanation or excuse I did chop down that cherry tree Besides wanting credit that I told you I had made a mistake even though I could have kept it to myself. Besides not engaging in subterfuge I give you the gift of trusting The gift of saying what you need The gift of seeing that you got it The gift of being of partnership The gift of asking for what you want really The gift of sharing what threatens you The threat you feel by merely being alive And taking on this big huge over the top goal for some little girl from the country Some little girl looking to be the President of a company And so many balls in the air And players playing and who is going to do what when The gift of cleaning up a mistake

My father killed himself with a perfectly legal handgun left over from his law enforcement days.  He kept it long after he retired, in the top drawer of a mahogany chest of drawers in our big hall, unloaded but right beside the ammunition. My brother and I knew not to touch it…not ever. Dad was troubled about his health, and the gun was handy and available that December morning. I don’t know if he would have used another method. I just know he didn’t.

Every night I see the same thing, crutches, stretchers, ambulances poised nearby, just in case the combatants fall. After all, it’s football, every night the same thing, have you noticed? It used to end on New Year’s Day, with the Orange Bowl at night. All the time I was growing up, Cotton and Sugar early, Rose in the afternoon and Orange at night, and if you stayed up for the end on the East Coast you’d be tired at work on January 2 nd . But now it stretches on even past the twelfth day of Christmas, a new bowl game every night into the second week of January. And all will apparently get high ratings on TV. Bread and Circuses, that’s what the Roman poet Juvenal said the people’s hopes had been reduced to. That was in about 100 A.D. Today we crowd into our own coliseums for our version: Beer and Football. It’s what we LIVE for, according the commercials on television. Talk about opiate of the masses! Beer and TV and football are more pervasive than Protestantism today in

Time flies, and then it creeps.  Time is an animal that stalks me in my sleep. I am in a hurry to get things done so I can get some “down time.” Speed up to slow down. This is what I have learned about time. It varies with my level of engagement, with my mood. When I am enjoying myself I don’t notice the passage of time. When I am bored or distracted, I check my watch or my phone. Certain tasks take as long as they do, like making dinner or comforting a child. Other tasks must be completed in the allotted time, like getting to the airport. Time is in the hands of the clock-watcher: has it been “a whole hour” or “just an hour?” I walked out into the backyard at Mom and Dad’s place in northern Virginia on the morning after Christmas. I had our new black and white dog on a red leash as she ran into the snow! Realizing it was her first time in snow, I had to let her go off the leash for a few minutes at least!  Leaping, sliding, eating the crunchy white stuff caked on s