Why, Yes. Yes There Is a Doctor in the House.

The African elephant, I recently learned, has the longest gestation period of all mammals—22 months. That sounds painfully exhausting if you ask me. But I can tell you with certainty that the African elephant has nothing on the American PhD candidate.

Nine years ago, when we had one tiny baby (and we thought our lives were busy), we moved to Dallas, Texas, where my husband would pursue a Master’s Degree in Literature. A year later, he was enrolled in the doctoral program at the University of Dallas and was on his way to earning a PhD.

I, naïve young thing that I was, truly believed that in a mere three, or at most four, years we’d be walking away from that fine institution cradling a sweet little diploma in our arms.

I, of course, ought to have known better; I have had a college student in my household for all but a few short years of my life. I have had a graduate student in my immediate family for half my life, at least. Higher education is and has always been my bread and butter. My own father, if I’m not mistaken, was a college student for fourteen years, and I was old enough to remember when he finished his PhD. (There was great rejoicing.) So why I assumed that my husband would have no trouble accomplishing such a feat in a few short years, I do not know. Looking back now, the expectation seems completely ridiculous.

“I recognize a workhorse when I see one,” said my husband’s professor as he introduced Jayson before his final public lecture two weeks ago, “and when I took one look at Dr. Grieser’s faculty description on the website of the college where he teaches, I could see that that’s exactly what he is.”

It’s true. Only a workhorse (or maybe an elephant) would do what my husband has done. But at that moment, I wanted to stand up and tell everybody present, “You don’t know the half of it.”

For the young, childless bachelor living on nothing but student loans and ramen noodles to complete a doctorate is nothing to sneeze at, I suppose. But for the family man who does the same thing—while simultaneously retaining a full-time job, a social life, and a church life, as well as the love of his wife and five children—some special honor should certainly be added to the degree: PhDE, perhaps (Doctor of Philosophy, Extraordinaire.) Give that man an extra stripe on his academic robe, say I, and an extra tassel on his tam. It wouldn’t be too much, would it, if I followed him around town holding a flashing neon Applause sign over his head, would it? Surely not.

Plenty of people have asked me, “Isn’t it such a relief for him to be done?” And the answer, of course, is yes. But it is more than a relief; it is pride and gratitude and euphoria and fatigue, all rolled into one. If you have ever given birth to a child, you know exactly what I mean.

But just as with the birth of a child, when one kind of labor is finished, a new kind of labor begins. Much as I may wish we could take an extended vacation to celebrate the completion of this degree, I have to remind myself of the saying repeated every year at graduation by my husband's students: Omni cui multum datum est, multum quaeretur ab eo. (To whom much is given, much is required.) Jayson, workhorse that he is, had hardly taken on the title of "doctor" before he moved on to the task of planning new classes to teach and making improvements to the classes he currently teaches. He finished his glass of champagne, and then took up his books again for the work ahead. After all (as Shelley once observed), "nothing wilts faster than laurels that have been rested upon."

Now that the dissertation is complete and successfully defended, you can only imagine how good it feels to be delivered of that 250-page burden. It took my husband nine years of graduate school to bring forth that baby. Nine years. That, if you're counting, is the gestation period of the African elephant five times over. So if you notice a new lightness in his step, you now understand why.

After all these years, I am delighted to finally report that yes, there is indeed a doctor in the house.

Cabbages and kings

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—
Of cabbages—and kings—
—Lewis Carroll

My kids were playing quietly after their naps yesterday, I'd finished folding another load of laundry, and I'd gotten some small projects done. It had been a reasonably good day, but in the middle of another grimy-gray January afternoon, I was feeling a bit gray myself, and the second latté of the day wasn't infusing much energy into my veins. I always appreciate a good cuppa, especially now that I can smell again, but on this particular Monday, the java wasn't quite potent enough to cure the winter blahs. Caffeine can only do so much. I meandered into the kitchen in search of ideas for dinner and, after rummaging through the refrigerator for a while, resolved to whip up some coleslaw. Not much excitement there, but I had the ingredients on hand.

Then I sliced into this, and found the little splash of color I was looking for:

Ta-da! I bet you didn't know that cabbage is a natural mood enhancer.

Okay. Strictly speaking, it's not. At least not in the way you might think. But slicing into a red cabbage and looking at all that spiraling graphic artistry gave me reason enough to pause, kitchen knife in hand, and marvel—reason enough to call three-year-old Paul into the kitchen to share the marvel with me. "It looks like beautiful paint," he said.

Annie Dillard describes beauty as "a grace wholly gratuitous." "Gratuitous grace" may be redundant, but in that cross-section of cabbage, I could see again what she meant—the surprising discovery of beauty in the most unaccountable places—on my cutting board, next to a Wüsthof knife streaked with purple. Gratuitous grace it certainly was.

Beauty didn't need to be there. Truly, it didn't. I think we would eat cabbage even if it did not look like "beautiful paint." Some scientists hypothesize that we perceive beauty merely out of biological necessity; it's all about preservation of the species, they say. That kind of straight-faced silliness makes me want to laugh and taunt them with a cut cabbage. Clearly these scientists never made cole slaw. Clearly, they know nothing of grace. Grace was right there, lying in wet halves before my eyes on the kitchen counter. And if I can find this gratuitous grace there, I can, it seems, find it almost anywhere, provided I open my eyes widely enough to see it.

One of the delights of having small children is their high-pitched excitement at what, to the rest of us, seems like nothing much. I remember taking our oldest son, Jonah, to the Fort Worth Zoo when he was not yet two years old. We held him on our shoulders to give him a better view and pointed, telling him—with exaggerated zeal—to "look at the colorful birds!" At the "great-big elephants!" At the "tall giraffes!"  I was disheartened to see that, even after our enthusiastic drumroll, my little boy took a brief look at the wildlife and then gave his attention wholly to the industrial fans blowing above our heads.

After seeing countless National Geographic specials, it was all too easy for me to miss the fun in watching a herd of awkwardly galloping giraffes. But what excuse did my wide-eyed toddler have for failing to squeal with glee? I think the answer is simply that he could not have recognized that a giraffe was any less common in Texas than a cockroach. And, let's face it, cockroaches can move a lot quicker. For a person so new to the world, everything is fresh, and everything is astonishing, so the common things hold as much fascination as the exceptional, and a fan can be as captivating as the Grand Canyon. But at the time it bothered me that our son was missing the point of the zoo "experience." To be distracted by the bright tropical plants or the contrived animal "habitats" I could maybe understand. But c'mon, kid. A fan? We can see those at home. For free.

But that's exactly what I did not understand. My emphasis was all wrong. Why would I want my children to be bored with what they can see everyday? I can see a fan at home! For free! Why should I not be thrilled at the very idea? All four of my babies have been held transfixed by the sight of a slowly rotating ceiling fan. And why did that always strike me as funny? We sophisticated people know how to have contempt for the unexceptional. To be bored has almost become a mark of refinement, and  any American high schooler knows that it's not cool to be easily impressed. But why? That day at the zoo, Jonah was experiencing what we all could use a little more of: wonder in the ordinary.

I know that this idea is nothing new. This has all been said before by folks more eloquent than me. But if the idea is right, and I think it is, we must not despise it simply because we've "heard that before."  I could use a reminder almost daily to look—really look—at the jaw-dropping spectacle that surrounds me every waking moment.

Look at the way the sunlight refracts rainbows across the shiny side of a CD. Give your attention to the iridescent shimmer on the multiplied eyes and the microscopic veins tracing through the wings of an ordinary housefly. Watch the way the steam swirls and churns the air as it rises from your morning shower and turns to dew on the bathroom mirror. Make coleslaw, and call the whole family in to watch as you reveal the "beautiful paint" inside a cabbage. Open your eyes wide enough to see the gratuitous grace in everyday life. Because life, as someone once said, is beautiful.

A taste of Texas

A couple of weeks ago we had our first visit from some Dallas friends! Dan and Wendy are good friends from our Church in Texas, and Dan even drove our moving truck with Jayson all the way up to Moscow when we moved last summer. We had a great visit with them; they're the kind of people who make you feel like you never really left. They also spoiled us with some fantastic bottles of wine! Plus, it was a great to spend some quality time with the McIntoshes again, too. (We've hardly seen each other since we both moved back up here!)

Bea, Emma, Paul and Jude enjoying each other's company after a long separation. They were watching a video here, but I'm sure it was thoroughly edifying and educational.


Wendy and Asaph having a good laugh


Wendy, Annie and me. Just like ol' times.


And the fellers: Jonathan, Dan and Jayson.


Had to throw this photo in, too. Look! Jayson and I are in the same picture (with Jude)!