"why love, of course, instant love"

What is it with red-haired women named Mary?

First there's this in Manalive by Chesterton:

This was a slight young woman in dark gray, and in no way notable but for a load of dull red hair . . . Her surname seemed to be Gray, and Miss Hunt called her Mary . . .

Later:

"It's Mary," said the heiress, "my companion Mary Gray: that cracked friend of yours called Smith has proposed to her in the garden, after ten hours' acquaintance, and he wants to go off with her now for a special license."

Then this, which is, as Hollywood says, based on a true story:

From a small group discussion

Prospective Dad: So -- how do you raise children to be good people?

Me (speaking for other experienced parent and myself): As soon as we find out, we'll let you know.

Not that our kids are not good people -- it's just that they're works in progress.

Vanishing Witness (Updated)

My son (we'll call him First Timothy) tells me that while home alone today, he answered the door to "the world's fastest Jehovah's Witness", who handed him an invitation to some event and fled. First Timothy actually pursued him with a copy of Pillar of Fire, Pillar of Truth, but the guy had a head start, fueled perhaps by the stories I suspect the JWs tell each other about our fearsome dwelling and its inhabitants.

A home auto-da-fe was immediately held, I am told.

ETA: I feel compelled to add, it was the paper he burned, not the distributor. I don't want to be hunted down by any Jehovah's Witness Protection Program, let alone the actual police.

What I did Friday instead of posting

• Called home twice while grocery shopping
• Got lost on public transit
• Saw portfolio show at art school -- lace is in, salt is out
• Read (in transit) most of The Duchess of Malfi, which I was supposed to do 30-some years ago. Sorry!

Blue and cold

 Just finished re-reading Hans Brinker, which, being a 19th-century children's novel, is full of moral and historical lessons and wild coincidences leading up to a triumphantly happy ending, yet in the midst of all of it sets before you this insight into the mind of a girl who struggles to love her father:

Gretel looked at her in troubled silence, wondering whether it were very wicked to care more for one parent than for the other, and sure—yes, quite sure—that she dreaded her father while she clung to her mother with a love that was almost idolatry.

Hans loves the father so well, she thought, why cannot I? Yet I could not help crying when I saw his hand bleed that day, last month, when he snatched the knife—and now, when he moans, how I ache, ache all over. Perhaps I love him, after all, and God will see that I am not such a bad, wicked girl as I thought. Yes, I love the poor father—almost as Hans does—not quite, for Hans is stronger and does not fear him . . . I don't want the poor father to die, to be all blue and cold like Annie Bouman's little sister. I KNOW I don't. Dear God, I don't want Father to die.

Of course, this being a book of its type, the dreaded father got that way through a brain injury while doing his job in difficult conditions, not through, for example, drinking steadily till he cared about nothing else. Still, lots of alcoholics' children must have read that and silently nodded.

Gone public

Awhile back, I mentioned a private blog I was reading; it's now public, as it was originally, so here is Cheeky Pink Girl.

Unfortunately, it went public because going private didn't stop its persecutors from sneaking in. Charlotte is perfectly willing to fight in the open; they're not.

Anyway, just read her story.

What I did yesterday instead of posting

• Spend a lot of time looking for stock photos to illustrate very specific ideas (a couple of them from articles of my own)
• Clean the bathroom I share with three males
• Talk to our accountant and insurance rep about dead ends
• Make beef stew
• Work a penitential service (I had to keep an eye on the priest hearing confessions by the back fire exit [ha!] and tell people when he was ready for the next one. At first, I waited till I saw him raise his right hand -- and there were false alarms as he was quite the gesticulator -- then I saw that, when he leaned back and listened for a longish time, an Act of Contrition was being made, and considering the distance, it was time for the next person in line to start on their way. In answer to some question from an old gentleman, I said, "I don't know, it's the first time we've done it this way" and he said, "I hope it's the last!")
• Scrape wax off the altar (don't ask)