My first bride dinged my cellphone at 6:47 a.m. with this message: “Your morning quiz! What is an embarrassment?” My first two grandchildren know that their maternal grandparents have differing talents and as a resource, can be separated into “math grandparent,” and “word grandparent.” They call me for help with language, and Cathy for help with numbers. The number grandparent was sending the word grandparent a challenge. That exchange was the first happy-maker of my day. The second was the call from my financial advisor.
“CJ!” Mike Sondergard opened his call to me at 8:32 a.m. (St. Louis time) with that joyful exclamation. He went on to say that he had received an envelope from me and claimed that I “stole (his) eyeballs” away from his Forbes magazine. Michael (Mike) Sondergard is a wealth manager for Money Concepts; I met him after I was spilled onto the curb by the closure of St. Louis’ Famous-Barr Department store in 2008. He has managed my retirement funds since then, and in a recent review call — usually conducted in the office, but since I am now 245 miles away, by phone — he was excited to hear that I was the weekday caretaker of my newest granddaughter. He said something complimentary about the effect that I might have on her life, and I decided to send him some columns that I have written about my travels with Myah (sorry, Mr. Steinbeck), and some pictures of her.
I would define the relationship between Mike and me as one of “bizfriends,” a name I have coined for people who have a business relationship but who like each other beyond those boundaries. I’ve spoken to him in the past about my passion for shooting pool, one shared with his late father. He told me that his father said that the best 9-ball break was when the cue ball contacted the one ball “in the air.” On this day, we talked of writing, and grandparenting, his counsel to his son on the words to write to get into medical school and about his 4-year-old grandson, Noah, who appreciates his grandfather’s admiration for the size of his bowel movement, (my son got credit for a healthy one) and who got some valuable tips on how to conceal his theft of fruit rollups. But through it all, I felt his admiration for the precious care and companionship I give and receive from my youngest grandchild, the “Twinkle” I wrote about in a Weekly View column published on May 10th, 2018, 7 days after Myah was born.
Mike expressed gratitude for my having shared something with him (“You stole my eyeballs!” he laughed) so infinitely personal, and asked if two of his other clients, people with whom I had worked at Famous-Barr, knew of my writing. “They do,” I laughed, as I remembered the impudent and humorous newsletter that I designed, wrote, produced and distributed for the advertising department. In a 23-minute phone call on a Tuesday that saw me without my granddaughter (she was with her maternal grandmother) I talked and laughed and smiled and heard in Mike’s voice, wonder and delight.
After two teasing hints, Bride One revealed that an “embarrassment” is the group name for a gathering of pandas, but a “happy-maker” is my name for any moment that gives me wondrous pleasure. I learned about the panda group on that morning, but I had already defined the word for the great and gleeful moments that I received from Cathy and Mike, who, unbeknownst to the other and in a ricochet of joy, each granted me a happy-maker.