I Love Seminary

Seminary is a great thing.

Josh loves it!

And I love moments when he brings me stuff like this, from seminary:

The Lanyard, by Billy Colllins

The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
off the pale blue walls of this room,
bouncing from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
I found myself in the "L" section of the dictionary

where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one more suddenly into the past --
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that's what you did with them,

but that did not keep my from crossing

strand over strand again and again

until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sickroom,
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips,
set cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to talk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,

which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,

and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,

and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,

is a smaller gift -- not the archaic truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-toned lanyard from my hands,
I was as sure as a boy could be

that this useless, worthless thing I wove

out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

(P.S.  What does a mom do with a lanyard?  She loses it.  Then her son, who gave it to her, with a lovely poem, finds it.  Under the couch.  Where the mom 'lovingly' placed it.  So she makes up for it by taking his photo and posting on her blog how much she loves him.  Because, frankly, a lanyard IS worth it!)