Agape and Personhood. David L. Goicoechea

      But, if Gramma said: “bacon, eggs, toast and jelly”

      in her sweet, prolonged, intoned, musical way they

      would become unforgettably lovely in your memory forever.

      Mother took on her mother’s lovely and playful tones

      and her speech had something of a prayer that deified things.

      Already in the second grade the discipline of her school work

      was taking mother into a logic that was on the alert for

      any mistakes or any self-deceit that might hinder truth.

      The teacher gave her spelling exercises and checked each letter

      and began to develop in mother a careful precision that tried

      to get everything on the map of life and in the book of life just right.

      And mother’s attitude guided her words in style, form and content.

      I.1.8 In the Peace of a Gentle Touch

      From her mother and her practice mother learned how

      to comfort a lamb, or cat, or dog in distress and to hold

      and rock her baby brother in the way of soothing peace.

      In her concern for the troubled other she could take

      an hysterical animal or a panicking child and quickly

      bring him or her into the complacency of a pleasant peace.

      The joy of her agapeic attitude and affirmative mood

      reached out into the healing caress of her fingers and

      with their touch into her words so that she was a peace maker.

      Her touch spoke volumes and her thoughts and words touched so

      that anyone who came into her presence was touched by an angel.

      Gramma Coates had something of a fun play in her voice,

      a near devilish twinkling in her dancing brown eyes

      and a healing power that could calm the devilish in her touch.

      But Gramma Coates as an only child had a sprite’s breeziness

      while mother as a first child who learned to mother young

      was a more serious and efficient calmer of troubled waters.

      The Episcopalian ladies of Spokane became daughters of

      the Rebecca Lodge and in their service club they volunteered

      like their counterparts in the Masonic Lodge and had good fun

      as they built small communities with their work together.

      Gramma Coates was an expert of extroversion in her sociality

      and conviviality and mother followed her example, but not quite,

      for as more introverted and tranquility orientated mother took time

      with the laying on of her hands whether she was teaching her

      children to comb their hair, tie their ties, or brush their teeth.

      Her common sense from childhood on that aimed at excellence

      was more hands on and inner-world serious in its care.

      In the third grade mother was riding to school on horse back

      with her six year old sister, Mildred, holding on behind her.

      And mother was a natural teacher and she helped the teacher

      teach the first graders their reading, writing and arithmetic.

      I.1.9 In the Construction of Upbuilding Deeds

      Gramma Coates knew that our deeds as works of love

      are all important and she knew how significant her example was

      for her children and everyone just as Aunt Sadie’s had been.

      Mother believed with her mother in performing good deeds

      and she also sensed that good intentions are not enough.

      Gramma Coates had allowed grace to heal her heart and she

      prayed: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

      We do not know what we do for our deeds are motivated by

      preconscious forces in the attitudinal moods of our very bodies.

      In order to upbuild our loved ones and ourselves we have

      to cultivate totally constructive creeds with positive canons

      and codes of behavior that are not negative and judgmental.

      Because of the complexities of our relationships, as we see

      in the case of Gramma Coates and mother, we are very limited

      in our knowledge and in the logic of our thoughts, words and deeds

      but we trust in goodness despite the evils that threaten us.

      We can cultivate becoming the-glass-is-half-full persons

      and by putting ourselves in healthy relations stop giving in

      to being the-glass-is-half-empty persons or born losers.

      As Mother identified with her mother’s agapeic heart

      and her truth pursuing mind and her spirit’s quest

      for excellence and her body’s habit of constructing

      a healthy immune system, Mother was already in the habit

      of performing deeds that would cultivate the soil of a good heart

      that could bring forth rich fruit from trees in the good earth.

      That proverb: “By their fruits you shall know them”

      pragmatically guided mother’s mother and thus Mother

      who as a nine year old girl was like St. Paul freed

      from self-indulgence to perform the works of love

      that could serve others in cultivating love, joy, peace,

      patience, gentleness and all those fruits of the spirit.

      In the mother-daughter bonding mother received a loving faith.

      I.2 With Her Mormon Father

      I.2.1 In the Logic of the Triad

      Levaur Paul Coates was as proud as could be when his little daughter,

      Joneva Mae Coates, was born in Hailey, Idaho, on September 6, 1917.

      What a relief it was that everything went so well, for as soon as

      Leona had her first rhythmic cramps they got in their Ford Pick-Up

      and quickly drove the thirty five miles to Hailey, and Dr. Fox

      and his nurse at once took care of the anxious, soon to-be mother.

      Levaur checked in to a near-by hotel and from there kept watch.

      The next morning Leona introduced him to his daughter and she was

      well formed and healthy and normal and everything was alright.

      And the daughter did identify with the mother in all the deep down

      and important ways and was well mothered in her young, joyful

      mother’s land of milk and honey and she grew up secure in herself.

      Her father was always there too as he worked hard with the sheep

      and the whole outfit,