Warrior: A mixed martial arts, slugging, sweating, face-kicking, wrestling, ugga-ugga-grunt, guy beer movie.

My eyes would glaze over and my dainty feet would turn and hasten along the straight and narrow path to the Jane Austen aisle.

How wrong I’d be.

This is the best movie I’ve seen since… since…

?

This movie is the reason I will be faithful to movies for the rest of my life, no matter what they do to me. I will never forsake them. Warrior is all I suspected above and yet, it is art.

There I’ve said it.

I’m not going to rehash the plot and spoil everything. I’m just going to give you enough to hopefully jump start some interest.

It’s the story of two brothers (see, studmuffins above) and their father Paddy – played to award-winning perfection by Nick Nolte.

I have seen faces like Paddy’s many times in my life. So have you. On it are written… etched… the sins of a lifetime. Indelible. They will be there even in Paradise, as a memorial, like the Wounds of Christ. Sin and Redemption are not pretty. They are terrifying, mysterious, and radiant.

Paddy’s adult sons have carried their father’s burden all their lives. They have never fully grown out of – or rather broken out of – their ruined childhood. They, who should cling to each other, are divided and estranged.

The setting for the change that must come is a mixed martial arts tournament in which they must fight each other. This is where the far fetched guy/beer entertainment factor comes in. All the while, the interior drama is real.

The writer, Gavin O’Connor, appears to be a Catholic. You figure it out from watching the movie and then the above rosary seems to clinch it.

But do not expect Warrior to resemble one of those movies written by Christians and funded by mega-churches that hope to express “gospel values.” The only thing it has in common with those is that it’s not dirty and does not contain an inordinate number of F-words. (Some. Well placed.) You don’t wanna gather the kids around it to feel inspired and hear a sermon. Jesus isn’t there to be our cheerleader and lead us to a better, brighter, sunnier place or to notarize our wishes or to dispense worldly favors like a spiritual vending machine. He is there invisibly to do what He does best – to suffer and to put to death the old evil man in us so that we might live.

Copyright 2012 Susie Lloyd

They were saying they have this friend who quit his job as a salesman because he was too good at it.

Right.

He felt bad getting people to buy things. Things that they might not need or really even want.

I’ve met this friend and I believe it. Even though I’m tighter than spandex on a Walmart shopper, he can sell me something I don’t need or want anytime.

So just as my noble minded daughter and future son in law were wrapping up the conversation on mutually agreeable terms, I jumped in.

“You guys are crazy,” I said nobly and agreeably. “Getting people to buy things is the name of the game! It’s not immoral. They have free will. He’s not hypnotizing people!”

Consider:

My daughter (another one, I have a lot) works at Swankee Candle. (Motto: Collect them all! What else are they good for?) She is great at getting people to buy more than they come in for. Though I have no clue how.

People like me do not shop there. We do not even shop in malls that carry that store.

Now, what if someone does go in there and gets drunk on the candle fumes, and goes into a buying frenzy? They do not need to sell their home. After they sober up, they can always bring the stuff back.

But who knows? Maybe they will keep it. Maybe they DO need or want this stuff after all.

Suppose my daughter convinces them to buy a candle that they don’t personally intend to use but would make a great gift for their mother in law’s birthday? They can now cross mother in law OFF the list just like this:

Mother in law.

They feel great. Not only did they enjoy crossing off mother in law, they do not have to spend excessive amounts of time worrying about what to buy, shopping around, getting home late to let out the dog, finding the couch half-eaten, and the rug a swamp. She has done them a favor.

That was my theory anyway.

The funny thing is that the very next day I had a chance to test it.

I went to my favorite local appliance store to look for a dishwasher. This is the place that sold me my beautiful GE stove. What’s so beautiful about it, you want to know? It doesn’t look anything like the one I threw away.

Anyway, I had such a good experience there with two different salesmen and have had nothing but joy pushing buttons on this stove and getting it to actually heat things that I’ve been telling all my friends about this store ever since. My friend Steph even went in and bought the same model.

So I go in there and what happens?

Would you believe nothing?

I walk in, say hello and no one comes up to me. They say hello back but stay comfortably seated. Apparently they are posing as salesmen for an appliance store scene at Madame Tussauds.

So okay, I throw them a hint: “I would like to buy a dishwasher.”

Salesman One points: “They’re over there.”

Okay… Perhaps he will follow me. I walk over and read price tags. This is not a fun place to start.

So I walk back over and drop another hint: “Could somebody come over here and show me these dishwashers?”

To his credit, Salesman One gets up.

He follows me over and stands there silently, politely waiting for me to pick a topic.

I decide not to mention how rampant anti-Catholic bigotry has really got me down lately and say instead, “Tell me about these dishwashers.”

“What do you want to know?”

I shrug. “Everything? I’ve never bought a dishwasher before.”

“Do ya have one?” he says. I detect a slight note of “Duh.”

“Yeah,” I concede, duly chastened. “But it was there when we bought the house and it’s twenty years old.”

He nods and starts reading the price tags out loud. Very informative.

Two more customers walk in and Salesman One stops, scans the store and frowns. “Hang on a minute. I need to get somebody else to help you. Everybody’s just sitting around on their butts.”

So he sends Salesman Two. Salesman Two approaches, feigning mild interest in possibly making me go away after he has done his duty and read me the requisite number of price tags. He shows no sign of flirting with me like the guy at Sears who sold me my expensive Dyson vacuum cleaner – a man who knew how to sell an appliance to a woman.

Anyway, I’m fine with business is business. Besides it’s my own fault – I haven’t done my make up and hair.

So I tell Salesman Two my absolute cap/limit/rock top price which is already a hundred or two bucks higher than it really is and he shows me a model that costs more.

So I say, “Hm, well okay. 30 bucks higher…”

And he says, “Well I’m not going to lower it 30 bucks for you.”

Duh.

I salvage my dignity and tell him I am not asking him to. It seems to placate him a bit. He begins to warm up to me and by the time I leave has almost made me remember why I went in there in the first place:

The smart salesmanship. The service. The right product to meet my particular needs.

THE TALENT! Don’t knock it.

Maybe I should tell Madame Tussauds to give the kids’ friend a call.

Meanwhile, I’m going to check Sears.

Copyright 2012 Susie Lloyd

What do you think of this lead in:

“I had three dogs myself so I KNOW what it’s like. I don’t miss it. I am NEVER having another one.”

What? Why are you giving me that look? Oh, you have a dog? Well, I can be conciliatory.

“Once in a while, I think it would be nice to have another one. The kids want one. But then I see somebody walk by swinging that little bag of poo and I come to my senses. Sorry kids. Been there. Done that!”

Did you say something? You love your dog? Well, whatever. Don’t we all?

“I’m just sayin’ mine were a handful. The chewing alone. They wrecked so much furniture. The hair. Everywhere! And it took forever to potty train them. Then they had accidents anyway. What’s the alternative? A yard of mushy land mines. And they need SO much attention.”

Aha, you admit that it’s work! But… it isn’t really that bad? Your dog is… worth it?

“But they’re so expensive!”

Betcha never thought of that!

“You name it – collar, chain, leash, crate, dish, bed – unless they sleep in yours. Are you one of those people? FOOD – That’s a biggie. Vet visits. Flea and tick control. TOYS. Can we talk toys? They go through toys so fast. How do you keep up? But you have to. If you don’t give them toys, they get bored and wreck your stuff.”

Why are you walking away?

“Hey, don’t forget Obedience School! It goes up every year!”

You are dumbfounded. As you walk away you begin to think of everything you could have said if you’d had your fangs on you, like:

“What’s it to you? Am I asking you to feed my dog, vet my dog, or buy my dog’s toys?”

I know what you’re thinking… because that is what I am thinking whenever someone stops me and tells me exactly why they think I’m nuts for having a big family.

It amazes me that it still happens. When the kids were little and I was “pregnant again” it felt like it was hourly. I used to hide my pregnancies until basketball season.

Now half of my family is grown. There are no babies or pregnancies. Everyone is happy, healthy, working, studying. They’re not even ugly. How is this a problem?

And yet… recently, a friend’s grandmother openly sneered at me. Like I came over for a cup of tea, a chat, and – “Forget the cookie – I’ll have one of your sneers instead. Delicious! Did you make it yourself or did you pick it up on the way?”

Not long after that, a hairdresser did the same thing. Since when is, “The customer is always insulted,” a business maxim?

Over the years I’ve tried the “I love my kids” argument and gotten pretty much the dog treatment above.

Maybe I should have tried, “So which one of us is fat?”

But no, we’re supposed to be patient. People parrot this stuff without thinking. They would think it the depth of rudeness to insult an innocent dog – even if he is too busy biting fleas off his butt to listen. But it’s always open season on kids.

Kids who are standing right there. Not a butt flea in sight. Kids who are listening.

My kids.

Worse, their own kids.

Maybe patience is NOT the answer.

Some good news. Now that some of my kids are grown, I know that these remarks haven’t hurt them. They know that what these people say is not the truth. They are not evaluated like pets, on the basis of bother and expense or joy and pleasure.

The “I love my kids” argument is useless and subjective.

The intrinsic worth of my children has nothing to do with me. They are an image of God, purchased with the price of His blood.

What about those other children – who are just as valuable as my children? Do they know it? What do they grow up thinking?

I wish people would think about that.

No, maybe patience is NOT the answer.

Copyright 2012 Susie Lloyd

Exactly. Only make it January or February.

This is the season in a homeschooler’s life when you get sick of sacrificing.

Your reasons for choosing homeschooling have changed.
Whatever they were so many years ago…

There was a time when it captured your heart. Everyone said, “Don’t do it. It’s a big job.”
     No, it’s not a job, you would think back. It’s a vocation. A calling. 
The naysayers only made you more determined.

You expected great things. You wanted to make a difference. You thought – though you didn’t dare say – that you might even be brilliant.

The years went by and you discovered that a vocation feels a lot like a job most of the time. A big job.

You decide not to think of the bigness of it all – just to go day by day. If God’s in His heaven, the days will add up and the big job will one day be done.

You stop wondering if brilliance is just around the  rainbow’s end. You work towards doing your job.

Because you’ve signed up for it.
And everyone’s got used to you doing it.
And they are counting on you.

YOU ARE ON AND YOU ARE IT!

Then, on a January or February day, the piercing wind settles down and you can feel the sun. You know it’s just a mid-winter thaw before a final blast of winter. It’s not spring. But for a day or maybe two, you get a whiff of spring in the air.

Manure?

No, it’s probably just rotting leaves leaving their fast frozen state. Their black nutrients penetrate deep into the soil, renewing it, feeding the earth, the yellow sod, the brave onion grass, the irrepressible dandelions.

A dandelion smiles up at you from a crack in the sidewalk. It stays low and snug against the brown earth. Your kids planted it when they picked the white fuzz balls and blew the seeds into the air – not knowing the bother they were causing speckling the yard with weeds – not knowing the joy that one brilliant survivor would bring you on a winter day.

You take the kids outside and show them. You show them the tiny buds emerging on the trees. It won’t be long now before you and the kids will emerge too, from your snug, warm house. Your spirits will lift and the season of sacrifice will pass.

It is passing now, settling down like the wind, letting you feel the sun. It streams in through the dusty window onto the kitchen table where your children finish their school work. Doing their job. Day to day. Just as you have taught them.

And it’s brilliant.

Copyright 2012 Susie Lloyd

Copyright 2011 Susie Lloyd

“Oh!” said one of the bookstore ladies, out of the blue. “Don’t let him take you to some dive.”

How ever did she know?

“Dear Lady,” I said reassuringly patting her hand, “You don’t understand. I WANT go to some dive.”

Many a time Greg has offered to take me somewhere nice and I’ve asked if he’d mind if we took it down a notch.

I freely admit it. I’m a cheap date.

Earlier in our marriage I wasn’t. I wanted to go to nice places. I wanted to put on the vintage little black dress. But I discovered as the years went on and the family grew (and I grew) and the money got stretched tighter and tighter (and so did the dress) that I was enjoying it less and less. It didn’t matter how good the food was, how quaint the atmosphere, good old Bill marched in at the end and dumped a bucket of cold water all over it. “Imagine all the food,” said Bill, “that you could put on the table for the whole family.”

One solution was to stop going out as often so that the few times we did go would feel legitimate.

But how fun is that? Not going out, I mean. Waiting months and months and months.

Not much – lemme tell you.

A couple of years ago we hit it – not the Lotto – a PLAN! We would go out once a week and get coffee at a bookstore. We both love books, just being surrounded by them makes us feel warm and fuzzy. A coffee shop in a bookstore – double bliss – which you agree would be a good name for a specialty coffee. “We’ll take two Double Bliss’s please. Make mine a decaf.”

Then my husband got laid off. For awhile we had been ordering the specialty coffees. Suddenly that was extravagant. Fine. It’s the date that counts. Plain coffee for me. There were times when Greg said he didn’t feel like a coffee – but that I should go ahead. Once, we drove out, combed the car for change, decided to hang out and talk in the car and then went home and brewed our own coffee.

But you know what? Being broke didn’t ruin our date. We needed those weekly nights out.

Just to have a conversation without the kids interrupting.
Just to be away from the phone, the computer, and the never ending temptation to work.
Just to have a fight in peace.
Just to have a laugh about it later.
Just to be alone and anonymous and unreachable (except in an emergency).

I’ve gotten so attached to those uninterrupted coffee dates that now when we do go out to dinner, I prefer to go somewhere with no waitstaff – like Wegman’s.

No one coming up every few minutes and asking if everything is all right.
No one hoping you’ll leave so they can usher in the next couple.
No one too friendly.
No one too rude.
No one. No one. No one.

Just us on our much needed break from all worldly cares.

Best of all, IT’S CHEAP!

Copyright 2011 Susie Lloyd

Editor’s Note: Today, we welcome author Susie Lloyd to our CatholicMom.com family of contributors. Susie’s fantastic books Please Don’t Drink the Holy Water and Bless Me, Father, For I Have Kids are treasures for Catholic moms and I’m thrilled to welcome her to the site! LMH

I’ve kissed my share of first class relics but I’ve never seen one that waved its arms and spoke Italian. No, not even in Italy.

Until now.

Dr. Gianna Emanuela Molla, the daughter of St. Gianna Molla, recently completed her first visit to the United States. One of her stops was just an hour from me at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa. (That’s Chest-a-ho-a to you-a and me-a.)

If our bodies are built cell by cell, out of the flesh and blood of our dear mothers, then Dr. Gianna is indeed a first class relic of her mom.

And anyone who has heard the story, knows she is more than that. 

She is the child for whom her mom gave her life.

In this, her first visit to the United States, Dr. Gianna told the story of her mom’s sacrifice. Her voice was high and a bit hoarse. Her accent charming. As was the moment she apologized to the packed church for running on so long.

Not at all, dear lady, I thought. We did come to see you, to hear you, to touch you. The choir, Father Pavone (you called him Pavone-ay – which is actually right), even the relics are second to you. Nevertheless, your concern is endearing. Whatever the Italian word for girlfriend is, you are it!

A chat over a latte would be lovely but frankly we don’t deserve it. We actually debated about whether we should go. It was the end of a work day for some. Another had to rearrange work. I had to get the three little ones to swimming. But my husband Greg gallantly took over for us. He had missed Mother Teresa, once upon a time… for baseball practice. Whenever I see him shake his head and sigh, I know he’s not thinking of an old flame. He’s thinking of that stupid eleven year old who didn’t want to miss baseball practice.

It turned out to be hardly any trouble for us. Some kind people, Robin and Elizabeth, who most edifyingly drove in from Connecticut, came, along with my girlfriend Christa, to pick us up. We were snug and cosy as fifteen homeschoolers in a Moby Dick van can be. Dr. Gianna, however, looked pretty travel weary. Even that was inspiring – the fact that she bothered to show up and be – not some polished public speaker/performer – but her weary, natural self.

I loved hearing her talk about her father. It surprised me and I like surprises. The sainted mother, of course. I expected it. But the other half was Pietro, the man she called “Daddy.” To hear her say her mom loved him passionately, so much that she was the first to declare it. And even to write to him that she wanted to start a Christian family with him. You don’t know how relieved that made me! I have a few outgoing daughters of my own. I always wondered how they could encourage their future shy suitors. Who knew they could almost propose?

Giana’s daddy was obviously worth it. He was the man who raised her. The man her mom left when she flew to heaven. The man who waited, a widower since 1962, who lived his final days in her care, the daughter he helped to save.

I liked also what she said about the privilege of being a doctor. How it is sacred like being a priest. A priest touches the body of Christ. A doctor touches the body of Christ in the person of the sick.

It tied in with what Father Pavone-ay said. The pro-choice movement says, “This is my body. I can do what I want with it even to kill the life inside of it.” Christ says, “This is my body. I give it up so that you may live.”

We stood in line to see you when it was over. But people kept cutting as if they were ordering cheese in a Roman deli. And I really didn’t want to push and shove Papal-mass style. It didn’t seem like the proper way to treat a lady and a guest. Besides, there were others there who needed to meet her. They had messages for her. All I had stored up was “Piacere Doctoressa!” But my daughter Molly, recently back from Rome frowned on it. “Um, I don’t think Doctoressa is right, Mom.”

Instead, Molly introduced me to some sisters she had met in Rome just a few months ago. Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara. She was excited to introduce me to “her sisters.” The ones who had drummed up last minute tickets to papal masses for her. One of them had given up her own ticket and shrugged, “You take it. I’ll blend.” (A perk of the habit.) They had invited her to visit just days before her departure. So she promised to visit them in PA. And, by Providence, here they were – not the same individual sisters of course. But the same. Just the same. Wearing the same habit and carrying same indescribable… something… that you want to be around.

The light of Christ. That’s it. That’s what they were carrying.
Just like Dr. Gianna.

Copyright 2011 Susie Lloyd