Mother of the groom: One of those moments

I'm keeping a list of moments that have the capacity to restore, in some small measure, my faith in how things are supposed to be.

It's getting longer all the time, with things like:

The wonder-filled smile of parents who have just heard their baby laugh for the first time.

The cautious jubilation of a child who has just mastered the fine art of riding a bike.

Two faithful friends enjoying a game of chess, as if it doesn't matter who wins as long as they play together.

A cool fall day and a walk to enjoy it in.

An April ramble down Sugar Ridge Road in Bristol, Texas when the bluebonnets are in full bloom.

A sweet Texas porch with a rocker.

The smoky tang of really great barbecue.

The feel of a really good book when you turn the page in expectation.

The swing of a tassel turned to the other side of the mortarboard at graduation.

Recently, I added a new moment to the list.

When a serendipitous double rainbow briefly claimed the sky over The Oaks on Aug. 10 like a benediction, a couple hundred wedding guests rushed to the massive plate glass windows of the historic Maryland country inn.

Photographers Brian and Rebecca Palmer knew what to do. They hustled the bride and groom out to the riverside grounds of the inn where Fay Wray and Gary Cooper stayed while making the last silent movie.

"We've never had a rainbow," Rebecca Palmer said later.

The groom was my son, and the pictures of him with new wife Megh under the arc that curves to form a circle in the reflection on the Miles River are so lovely they appear to have been Photoshopped.

Irish heritage runs deep in both the newlyweds' families, so it would be easy enough to draw the analogy that the pair had found love's gold at the end of the rainbow.

However, seeing them there, two lovely young people, an engineer and a teacher, their masters degrees behind them and their lives together ahead of them and their hearts openly brimming with newly-wedded bliss and love, at the risk of getting mushy and even completely maudlin, I make a mor e spiritual connection.

I remember some of the challenging places this young man has been, in particular. Our family has stories from his youth that would curl your hair – although the one about the six months he spent in a body cast after a go-cart accident comes to mind first, there are others. A number of them.

I see him, and her, and that rainbow, and I think of all the things I wish for them, and the things that have already come true.

It's my theory that the despondency we see in so many youth today comes from our failure as the adults in their lives to tell them what we've come through. Because they don't know – and we do – that the sun will come out tomorrow, like the song from the Broadway musical 'Annie' says. That there's a rainbow after the rain. That, like the Pink Martini song, 'Hang On Little Tomatoe!' says, it's important to dig in and hold on determinedly. That time heals all wounds, and all good things come to those who wait (and work.)

It's my observation that these are lessons we need to remaster, again and again, through life's rainshowers. Because the rains will come, oh yes they will – and they fall on everyone, sooner or later.

But for some reason, when I look at that extraordinary wedding picture that's now so dear to me, I'm reminded of the rainbow as a symbol of God's promise to Noah, and then to what English missionary William Carey said over 150 years ago.

"The future's as bright as the promises of God."

It's just one of those moments, I guess.

Bless their hearts

My son, 16, got his license today. His real one, the kind where you don't have to have your mum the backseat driver bugging you about leaving more distance between your car and the one ahead or unfurling impromptu lectures about the dangers of drinking or doing ANYTHING while driving or drinking, PERIOD.

Bless his pea-picking heart.

There's a spring in his step. He didn't whine about a single chore. If he could whistle while brushing his teeth, he'd do it. He's standing up straighter -- he looks to be about a head taller, five-foot-ten and hoping for an even six foot. Every teenaged pore seems to ooze the news -- he's not a kid any more.

Bless his heart.

He's already got plans for souping up his inherited 2000 Chevy with a better sound system that fits his iPod. The car's maroon, like the school colors, like his letter jacket with the fuzzy tennis rackets that says "District Boys Singles Champion" in maroon embroidery on the grey field -- the one that he wears even with shorts in the Texas heat despites its felt and its maroon leather.
In his spare moments, Patrick's reading the book I bought him called "So You Want To Be A Doctor" -- the medical field has captured his imagination after watching every single possible episode of the family's favorite show, House M.D. He's loaded his school schedule with every possible AP class and science and math, and he's making A's in every one of them, having connected the dots between grades and money for a bio-chemistry major.

And while the snarling, sneering monster of teenagedom rears its nasty head on occasions that are getting rarer all the time, little outbursts of sarcasm tinged with his own intelligent way of looking at the world he's rapidly growing up to, I see him purposefully striding toward adult status and navigating his way around the obstacles of temptation that so easily beset today's youth.

I remember the fair-haired, blue-eyed child of a dozen years ago, how he was so sweet-looking and irresistible that total strangers wanted to pat his head, the days when he starred as Ralphie Parker in the Ennis Public Theatre production of A Christmas Story. The time we were at the movies and an elderly gentleman came up to Patrick and patted his head, right there in front of us, and said "Looks like such a nice intelligent boy," and walked away.

I remember all those things and like Mary, I ponder them in my heart. and I think, Bless his heart.

I interviewed Sam and Kathy Harrell yesterday. Sam's one of the winningest coaches in Texas high school football history -- he coached the maroon boys, the Ennis Lions, to three state championships between 2000 and 2005.

And out of those Friday night lights, the most promising player to emerge to date was his son, quarterback Graham. Up for a possible Heisman, the Texas Tech Red Raider record-breaker is being courted for NFL stardom by a flock of Jerry Maguires.

Who knew?

When the Harrells recently moved into a new home in Ennis’ Oak Creek subdivision, Kathy ran across her son Graham’s favorite poster from his childhood days.

It was the shape of things to come.

At the bottom of the huge picture of Joe Montana, the fourth-grader and future Texas Tech record-setting quarterback had stuck a home-made label that read: “Graham Harrell – the next Joe Montana.”

“I remember thinking, ‘Bless his heart, he thinks he can play in the NFL!’ I didn’t want to burst his bubble, but I kind of felt a little hurt for him,” Kathy Harrell said, unconsciously putting her hand up to her heart.

To her credit, she didn't smack him down and put him in his place, nor did she take the opposite stance of hero-worship. At every stage, the Harrell have enjoyed their son's successes, without getting caught up in the idea that -- lo, and behold -- has come to pass.

Little Graham Harrell is all grown up, a dozen years later, standing within reach of that boyhood goal. He’s the nation's leading passer with 393.4 yards per game, moving into fourth place on the NCAA career passing yardage list with 13,829 yards. He has set school career marks in touchdown passes (117) and career touchdowns responsible for (129) and is the nation's active leader in both categories.

And pretty doggone sweet and unspoiled still, for all of it.

All's I'm saying is, sometimes you never know.

Bless our children's hearts.