In a Word

I'm reading a book about the history of Quaker beliefs and practices. Simplicity is one of four modes of recommended behavior. Simplicity in speech often gave Quakers a reputation for bluntness, but a single word can convey a lot, as I recently experienced.

I seldom understand what our almost-two-year-old friend, Ricardo, is saying; he doesn't talk a lot, and his primary language is Spanish. I was taking pictures of people at church, and as I sat there waiting for another subject, Ricardo climbed up by my knee. He put his face very close to the lens of my camera, and said, quite clearly, "Cheese."

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During a recent visit by my daughter and her two boys, we left the six-year-old home with Grandpa while the three of us went out. Grandpa was working in his office upstairs, and Kadin was downstairs, engrossed in a computer game. A couple of hours later, as we approached our neighborhood on the return home, we saw Grandpa riding off on his bike.

"Oh, no!" we thought, "he's forgotten he's supposed to be watching the six-year-old."

"Kadin will be very upset," my daughter said. "He'll throw himself at me and demand to know why we left him all alone."

We hurridley entered the house. Kadin was still intently playing his computer game.

"Kadin!" we said. "Did you know Grandpa left the house and you're here all alone?"

He looked up and said, "Cool."

Then he went back to his game.

To exonerate Grandpa, he had a doctor's appointment, and saw that Kadin was fully occupied. And to be fair, we had been away a lot longer than we said we'd be.

Inside Pockets

My London Fog raincoat has served me well for several years. Although long coats are not fashionable at the moment, I still feel elegant when I travel in this ankle-length, egg-plant colored, classic coat (especially when I wear matching pants and sweater underneath!) But, alas, the coat is getting old. It was dirty and some seams had begun to open up. So I mended and washed it. When I pulled the coat out of the washer to hang it dry, I was surprised to see a little pouch sticking out of the front placket. An inside pocket! I'd never known it was there, and I thought of all the times I could have used it for airline tickets, passport, hotel key card and the like --- times when I needed both security and quick access.

Then I remembered Bakk-Fikkan. We had been living for a few weeks at the Swedish research institute where my husband was working before I realized that another wife was also living on the campus. She and her husband were in Bakk-Fikkan, or "back pocket" in Swedish, a studio apartment hidden in the corner of a larger house.

We refer to pocket parks and pocket gardens, small hidden green spaces encountered unexpectedly in the midst of densely built-up areas. We have pocket dictionaries, pocket guides, pocket handkerchiefs, and pocket combs; they are all small enough to slip easily into a pocket. I don't like to buy pants unless they have a pocket (even though it makes me look more "puffy", as my grandson would say.)

In general a pocket is a small, self-contained space, often hidden. It can enclose something positive, like the examples above, or something negative, like a pocket of resistance, or a pocket of infection. Sometimes we discover dark pockets in a friend's personality.

I usually see the big picture first. Now I also look for pockets, and am surprised and usually delighted by the small treasures they hide.

Tin Cup

When I was a child, my mother kept a tin cup in the bathroom for us to drink from. It was actually an old, thin, aluminum measuring cup. I think it once had a lid, but by the time it got to the bathroom, it was lidless, old and slightly bent out of shape. I suppose Mom used it there instead of a glass because it wouldn't break. (These were the days before plastic.)

Whenever I was thirsty, I went to the bathroom, turned on the tap, and drank out of the tin cup. Although I'm sure that the water from all the taps in the house was the same water, it seemed to taste better from the bathroom tap and from the tin cup. Maybe it was colder.

Recently I got to thinking about my favorite drinking vessels now, and realized they're all metal! Every morning I sip my breakfast tea from a stainless steel mug. It's double-walled so it doesn't get hot on the outside. On the rare occasions when I drink coffee at home, I like it from a smaller, stainless steel cup with saucer that my daughter gave to me. It's the kind of cup you might find in a trendy Italian or French cafe.

When I'm hot, nothing hits the spot like a glass of iced tea. But not out of a glass, out of a tall, thin, stainless steel tumbler. I bought a set of them at a restaurant supply store, and they may have been intended for milk shakes. My son likes them too, so I bought him a set, much to the puzzlement of my daughter-in-law, who wonders why anyone would want to drink out of them.

And for ice water, I have a special sterling silver tumbler. It's smaller than I'd like, but the silver gets very cold from the ice, and while I quench my thirst, I also enjoy the tactile sensation of the very cold silver against my lips and in my hand.