There are only so many shapes and kinds of bowls to store in my kitchen cupboards and drawers before I lose my mind, especially where snack-sized bowls are concerned. With little kids in the house, the sheer number and variety of plastic snack-ware that wormed their way into our house were enough to knock the drawers off the tracks and the cupboard doors off their hinges. You can imagine my response then, Dear Reader, when our oldest son found the snack bowl of his dreams during a visit to the store one afternoon many moons ago.
“Look, Mom! I’ve always wanted a bowl like this!” His little face was beaming as he held up his prize for inspection. It was yellow with black lettering that advertised a popular cereal brand, and it had a clever plastic lid to block spills while still allowing the child to reach in and grab pieces of the snack. Brilliant. It also had two handles, which ruled out nesting into other bowls and, given that he had a younger brother and infant sister, we would need to buy not one but three in order to capitalize on the mess-proof design and prevent future arguments (thereby preserving my future sanity.) Nope. “Sorry, Sweetie, not today,” I said, breezing past him in the aisle in order to distract him with a new collection of tempting objects, and pushing the baby in her stroller while brother tripped along behind us, his little hand firm in his grandma’s grip.
Cue the anger.
To be fair, his anger was amusing. This kid rarely caused a fuss. He was and still is sunny and agreeable, so when he feels strongly about anything, it’s wise to listen. But there was also the small matter that he was actually allergic to that particular brand of cereal: using a bowl that advertised the very thing he was allergic to would confuse our friends and family members beyond defending and I was already often accused of being neurotic: life-threatening food allergies are difficult to understand and to navigate.
“I want to call Zeus,” he demanded, his feet planted where he was, his hands on his hips. It was a mystery as to why he could pronounce the word sphygmomanometer but not my sister’s name. I handed him my flip phone, thinking that he would pretend to call her and vent a little to save face.
“Fine. Call Aunt Suzi,” I said as I moved on to look at bibs (buying pink and purple things was intoxicating after all the blues and greens that previously dominated our house). To my surprise, I heard my sister’s voice respond to my son’s as he poured out his troubles out to her. At first, I was mortified that I let him interrupt her at work. Then, I shrugged. “Serves her right to teach him her phone number,” I told my mom. I continued strolling through the maze of bath toys and stuffed animals, listening carefully as the cadence of my son’s anger and frustration melted into calm and peace. He handed me the phone, Suzi still on the line. “You better have a good reason not to buy him a little thing like a bowl.” I couldn’t quite tell if she was disgusted with me or amused with her nephew.
Suzi didn’t solve my son’s problem. She didn’t swoop in and rescue him. She listened and advocated for him but respected my decision when I wasn’t budging. Kind of like, dare I say, the saints.
Like my little son, we make requests of Our Father in Heaven. We beg and plead our case. We explain why our way is best. Sometimes ad nauseam. When we have exhausted our efforts, we can also rally them by asking our friends and family members—even those who have gone before us—to make requests on our behalf. I often find myself tired of hearing my own voice, praying for the same things over and over again, not even certain that the thing for which I am asking is actually good for me or my community! When that happens, I often ask my grandparents and friends who are already in Heaven as well as my saint-friends to take up my cause and pray for me. This kind of prayer request brings me comfort: I know that, because they have experienced many of the same struggles, they offer a special kind of community. We call those who have gone before us the Church Triumphant. Canonized or not, they inhabit Heaven and have the unique perspective of having had a life well-lived and of experiencing the after-life. They can see around the corners we can’t and their prayers for us are better informed.
As a Senior in high school, my once-little son is no worse for the wear for not having owned the precious yellow snack cup. And while Aunt Suzi’s cell number has since changed, he and his siblings all have it memorized and still often call her for respite from their ridiculous parents. Frequently her intercession (interference?) works in their favor.
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