What of boasting? It is committed.
Josiah has heard from schools number two through four among his five applications, and Two College and Three College both wait-listed him, and Four College admitted him with a generous offer. That leaves Five College, a sort of wild-card; but not only is he a wanted undergraduate, but he’s wanted by more every institution to which he applied, and two of them want him enough to admit and fund him. You go, boy!
Margaret’s getting positive feedback from all around her; she’s doing great work in her classes, thinking hard with her profs and a wonderfully positive presence for her colleagues. She and Nate are studying hard and doing well, though since they’re both in remote locations, and since academic work involves fewer obvious occasions for laud, but they’re both spectacular.
Pippa continues making wonderful images with paint and pen and keyboard (Margaret and I cherish her email messages). At F2C, Dave isenberg brought out a t-shirt he’d been given by his print shop; it read in big letters, “God Bless America,” with an American flag imprint. He reckoned that the clergy delegate was the right conferee to get the shirt, so he threw it out to me. (This story does get back to how proud I am of Pippa.) I sat with the shirt displayed beside me through Thursday’s program, and brought it home, uncertain of what should become of it. When I explained the situation to the family, Pippa quickly pointed out some of the theo-political problems with the shirt; her first reaction was that it should be a prayer, but that instead it reads as a command. But she volunteered to take it, perhaps to wear inside-out or use for her painting shirt. Fifteen minutes later she came back. . . .
I’m so proud of them, it makes my heart pound. What, as Dick Leonard says, did I do to deserve this? [Don’t worry; you probably don’t know Dick. But he always used to say that when he lived with us, so the family always quotes him.]
After learning the happy specifics on Si’s blog, is this the point at which I say, “Send me your children!” in a Peter Lorre voice?
“Deserve it?” Here’s the best part: you don’t have to. That’s the way grace works. But then, you already knew that.(^_^)
Thank Chris Rock for this one entering the collective consciousness, via his very funny political satire Head of State. Throughout the movie, the incumbent President kept saying, “G-d bless America, and nobody else!” During the final Presidential debate, Rock does a great riff and ends, “G-d bless America, and EVERYBODY else!” observing that G-d has indeed blessed America.