Foxed Out

     I do not watch FOX news.  I don't even know if we have it in our basic cable package.  Reed and I try to limit our tv time to one hour per day.  I am not going to spend that hour watching the same news stories over and over or researching things to be worried about.  Many of the same people who ridicule the idea that without our environmental intervention the planet is doomed, are equally convinced that without our political intervention the country is doomed.  Too bad the God in control of the planet does not control our politics. Oh wait, he does.
     Each Christian should do what God has called them to and I greatly admire Christians willing to run for political office, knowing they will be subject to scrutiny and attack, ala Herman Cain. I also believe God calls Christians to support conservative candidates and legislation with their time and finances.  But I don't believe God calls any of us to criticism and despair. I want the overflow of my life to be about Christ, not politics, and I find that very hard to do when I fill my mind with media encouragement to look down on people who don't see things my way.  If even spiritual truth is a clashing cymbal without love, what must our trashing cynicism sound like to God?  If I find something on FOX that helps me fulfill Phil. 4:8, I will watch it, but frankly, the overflow of my news junkie Christian friends is seldom pure, lovely or of good report. I don't need help to be arrogant and critical.  I can do that all by myself.

Incomprehensible Incarnation

     I, who won't even stay at a cheap hotel, marvel at the thought of the incarnation.  One of the things most adults fear is dependency. We dread the helplessness of old age.  Babies don't resent being helpless, they don't know anything else, but Christ knew exactly what was in store for him and what he was leaving behind.  I am glad for our sakes that he was willing to do what was needed to accomplish redemption, but I wonder why, having achieved that goal, he didn't leave his human body behind.  He chose to identify with us forever, perhaps for our sake, probably for purposes known only to the godhead, certainly to fulfill all righteousness.
     And then there's me--unwilling to leave the comforts of my life long enough to go camping, or talk to that ragged person in the parking lot, or acknowledge my dependence by asking for prayer. The cheap hotel of my body is expensive to maintain, in desperate need of remodeling, the rooms are filled with junk, the tv shows mostly trash and yet the Holy Spirit is willing to move in long term until the complete renovation at an unscheduled future date.  If Christ was willing to put on human flesh for eternity and put up with me, what is truly incomprehensible is my willingness to put down my fellow man.  There is a lot more to sharing humanity than wearing skin.

Speaking of the Dead "il"

     Kim Jong Il, who won the dubious honor of being Parade Magazine's worst dictator several years in a row, is now dead and facing a godless eternity.  I would like to add the old testament epitaph "to no one's regret", but it appears some North Koreans are actually mourning him.  I have no idea why, but the phrase "better the devil you know" comes to mind.  Maybe even a despot grows on you after 17 years, maybe they think his son will be worse, or maybe they fear the country will collapse into anarchy.  One lesson I learned from studying the history of Israel is that the worst tyrant is better than anarchy.  When everyone is doing right in his own eyes, no one is. I do not know what is in store for North Korea but I know what is in store for Kim Jong Il--"the mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine".

Light in the Window

     My poetry class is finished so now I must post poems without the critiques that helped me polish some of the rough edges.  The following is one of several I hope to write about my maternal grandparents.  It is not just based on a true story, it is a true story.  The spiritual symbolism is so obvious I felt including it in the text would be like whacking the reader with a hammer.

     Light in the Window

When my grandparents married
in 1928,
they lived at the edge of the badlands
of eastern Montana.
Money was scarce
coal was plentiful,
so they traded loads
of coal
for goods in town.

Doors were unlocked
day and night.
There was nothing much
to steal anyway,
and neighbors were welcome
to what little they had.

In winter
locals lit an oil lamp
to place in the window
so anyone lost in the cold
could see the light
and find safety.
Keeping the light
to yourself
could cost a man
his life.

It was a different time
I think
as I lock the doors
and shut off the lights,
but the cold and lost
still wander
and the badlands
are dark as hell.

Dissing Stress

     The Christmas season is winding up, although judging by retailers it has been winding up since the day after Halloween. My December women's magazines are filled with an oxymoronic combination of how to make the perfect Christmas and how to handle the stress of Christmas. I am remarkably ahead of schedule this year; the gifts are bought, wrapped and delivered, Christmas cards mailed, tree is up, house decorated. I am glad to have those tasks completed, but any stress I felt about getting them done would be self imposed.  I think a lot of the stress of Christmas comes from unrealistic expectations we place on ourselves.  American life is busy, but our stress is the stress of abundance.
     Stress is not having your daughter's ballet recital and son's school program on the same night, stress is having two children and only enough food for one, or being unable to send your children to school because their small income is needed to support the family.  Stress is not looking for a parking place at the mall, it is having no transportation to take a sick spouse to the doctor.  Stress is not giving the perfect gift, it is living in unremitting poverty.
     In American culture stress is blamed for most health and emotional problems, and there is certainly validity to the harm that comes to both body and mind from never having, or taking, opportunity to rest and renew.
But Americans are stressed because we are blessed--with opportunities and choices unimaginable in most parts of the world.  I do not claim to be exempt from busyness, God usually uses busy people, but if Jesus made time to be quiet and alone, I certainly can.  I can think of better things to give myself for Christmas than self inflicted stress.

Stop Reading Now

    If you believe that King James English is inspired regardless of the content, stop reading now.  This post is not making fun of the Bible, I love and respect the Bible, it is simply a story written in antiquated language.

     Now the coming of the oven was on this wise.  One the eve of the Sabbath, the mistress of the house saw that the supper was not brown and savory as in past times. When she stretched out her hand, she felt no burning heat coming from the Negev of the oven.  She called for her husband who rent it asunder to take the broken piece unto the repairer of ovens. "This part is still whole," the laborer proclaimed.  "Good," the mistress said in her heart,"I shall seek a new oven".
     The mistress wandered the wilderness of Lowe's seeking assistance, because she knew not of ovens with less than three score years.  Bill, a seller of ovens for many years, shewed unto her one whose burning heat came from winds hidden within it.  The mistress longed for the oven and told it unto her husband.  "Buy it in haste." he said, for it was of lesser price than many of its kind.  "It will be delivered unto thee in one week," sayeth the seller of ovens.  But this displeased the mistress for she had much food to prepare for the coming Feast of the Nativity.  So her husband proceeded with haste to Lowe's to bring the oven back with his own conveyance.  When the mistress returned from the singing of carols at the Christian school, lo, the oven was in her house, and she was filled with joy.

The Ghost of Christmas Past

     I haven't blogged for a while.  I would like to say it is because I have been so busy getting ready for Christmas.  It is true that I am remarkably ahead of schedule this year, my gifts are bought, wrapped and delivered, the house is decorated, cards are mailed, but that is not why I haven't written--it is the Ghost.  For those of us who grew up in homes with addictions, abuse or, in my case, mental illness, our Christmas tradition was for the problem to get worse.  I call it the Ghost of Christmas Past.  For me it is not actual memories of bad things that happened at Christmas, it is the presence of feelings from the past.  Holidays are a focal point for memories.  We usually remember things that happened on holidays more than at other times through the year.  Holidays are a time when expectations run high, making the reality seem that much more disappointing. The Ghost doesn't ruin my Christmas, it just casts a shadow over an otherwise happy time.
     The bad news is the Ghost still comes, the good news is it comes later every year.  What used to come in September as a feeling that something threatening was just behind me, is now a mild sadness that began in December.  Someday the Ghost may stop appearing at all.  My best expression of this is the following poem.


     To All the Ghosts of Christmas Past

To all the ghosts of Christmas Past
whose vivid memories yearly cast
   their shadows on my joy,

As winter nears, I feel your touch
reach through the years, gray tendrils clutch
   and drag me to the past.

I close my mind to the memories
but, like disembodied spirits, these
   feelings still remain.

Despite the many happy years
of Christmas with my children near,
   the haunting goes on yet.

I wonder if I'll ever be
old enough to be set free
   and send the ghosts away,

to stand unshadowed near the tree
and feel the peace God meant to be
   part of Christmas Day.                                                            Dec. 2009

Comfort vs. Cheapskate

     As much as I love sleeping in on a holiday, I get up in the predawn darkness to shop the Black Friday sales, much as my hunter husband rises in the wee hours to be in the woods at sunrise and bag his game.  Loss leaders are a dream come true for a consummate cheapskate like me, and cheapskates like me are a nightmare to stores who count on customers to buy other things to recoup their losses on the loss leaders.  Just as any other shopping I do, I check the ads, buy only good sale items, and leave.  The only difference between Black Friday shopping and what I do the rest of the year is that it is dark.  In spiritual terms I could say I am trying to be the best steward of the resources God has given me, but the truth is I have always been cheap.  Black Friday bargains allow me to buy the nice gifts I would like my family to have without going over my budget.
     The Christmas issue of Good Housekeeping has money saving tips like assigning a set amount you will spend for each person on your list, drawing names to keep lists shorter, making postage, wrapping etc. fit within the gift budget, buying throughout the year etc.  I couldn't believe a magazine written for adult women would need to teach spending principles I figured out in grade school.  Growing up poor sure paid off for me, it kept me from forming great expectations. The expectations of today's middle class are much higher than when I was a child. Most of us baby boomers grew up in SILK (Single Income Lotsa Kids) homes.  The solution to not having enough money was living within your budget, not sending mommy to work.
     With the advent of credit cards and the example of our government, there is no longer any incentive for living within your budget except for us buy-hards who dislike debt.  Debt is just a four letter word for slavery.  Those who have no intention of paying what they owe are runaway slaves constantly changing jobs, locations, and phone numbers to avoid the "hounds" of creditors.  I hate debt, that common bondage is not an option for me.  I don't like long lines and shopping at 4 a.m.  I wouldn't face the crowds at Walmart Black Friday if they were giving away bars of gold.  But I love saving money and buying things for my family so I willingly sacrifice a few hours in the comatose crowds of crass consumers Black Friday morning. Those bargains allow me to stay in the black, and that helps me sleep comfortably the rest of the year.

Thanksgiving

     Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.  Its demands are few--food and gratitude.  Food is my love language, gratitude ought to be my lifestyle.  Thanksgiving has been relatively unexploited because neither family nor gratitude can be purchased, the only marketable requirement is food and we have to buy that on a regular basis anyway.  In keeping with the season, media is full of the generic gratitude considered acceptable in a post-Christian nation.  One story told of a man who transformed his life by sending a thank you card to someone in his life every day. This is a nice gesture that would certainly improve the sender's attitude as well as the recipient, but that is not the point of Thanksgiving.  Another article was about a woman who gives thanks to, not for, inanimate objects, thus removing the possibility of expecting appreciation in return. This may have changed her life but it probably had no effect on her latte or fabric softener.  In spite of her intentions, gratitude toward inanimate objects benefits only the giver. 
     I am so thankful that God had the inexplicable lapse of judgement to choose me to belong to him.  I do not have to waste thankfulness on lesser things like my prosperous nation or the turkey, I get to thank the God of the universe.  God would still be good if he had never done one thing for me but because he is God, he has given me everything.  Like any form of worship, the value of praise is in its object.  However humble the blessing and insignificant the giver, my praise goes to the most awesome being in existence.  And one day a year is set aside just for that--Thanksgiving.

Keeping Abreast

     I have become paranoid about posting poems before my poetry class has critiqued them.  They are so much better after I've reworked them.  This is the poem I brought to class last night.  It is based on a true story, Will really was the only male nursing student in a lab on breast exams, the rest is all me.  It was my first time writing a poem from three perspectives but it seemed to work.  I have no idea what Will will think of it.

                                    Keeping Abreast

Today's lab is: Guiding Women Through Breast Self-Examination

My son, the lone testosterone in a herd of female nursing students.
Always a loner, my Will,
content in his own company,
most at home in the woods.
He and his roommate have hiked
all over the "Bob".*
They make quite a pair. 

Pair off into groups of two.

Groups of two.  Must be the theme for the day.
...14...15  Thank you God, for making me odd.
I'll partner with Annie the practice dummy
and fake boobs.                --Will

I thought he might grow up to be
an outfitter, a hunting guide.
 
Guide her fingers around the breasts
as if they were the hands on a clock,
working from the outer edge
to the nipple,
moving from hour to hour
hunting for lumps.

This is like hunting
only we are hunting for something we don't want
to bag and tag--like a bear.
We are scouting for grizzlies.          --Will

It is important for her to distinguish
normal, rice textured, breast tissue
from lumps, which may indicate
a problem.

The problem is,
this is unfamiliar territory
so I'll need to search in a grid pattern.
Starting at the bottom of the hill,
I'll work my way up the trails
checking from side to side
noticing the terrain
searching for bears.           --Will

Even if a lump is found,
most are harmless
but occasionally they indicate cancer.
This cannot usually be distinguished
without a biopsy.

The woods are too thick to distinguish
between a black bear and a grizzly,
so I'll mark the position
of any bear sign
and investigate further when I have more light.           --Will

In school, Will was always better
with hands on learning.
I hope nursing school
gives him opportunity
for hands on experience.


10/23/11                                                                *Bob Marshall Wilderness

Great Moments in Mothering

     I never expected to be chosen as "Mother of the Year", I would have been lucky to make  "Mom of the Moment", but there are times I thought I was doing a pretty good job.  This event stands out in my mind because I was ironing and ironing was a rare, memorable event.  My husband wears uniforms to work and jeans and either T shirts or flannel shirts when he's home, so ironing doesn't come up all that often, but I used to do more of it when I was held captive in my home by young children.  I needed to put some freshly ironed clothes on hangers but didn't trust my toddler Tracy in the same room with a wobbly ironing board and hot iron, so I put six year old Will in charge of guarding the iron. His job was to hold the iron handle so it couldn't fall if his freshly warned brother got near the ironing board during the few seconds I was out of the room.
     Seconds later I heard Tracy crying.  With the disturbing distrust of a toddler, he had deliberately touched his thumb to the iron his brother was holding secure.  I was a "nursing" mom, by this I mean that I had medical training as a nurse aide at the hospital, so I sprang into Dr. Mom mode, carried Tracy to the kitchen, ran cool water over his thumb, snipped off a chunk of the aloe vera plant I hadn't got around to killing yet, and squeezed the cooling gel onto his thumb.  Congratulating myself on my quick thinking, I took my calmed child into his room for a nap.  As I picked up his doctored thumb to kiss his owie Tracy said, "It was the other thumb."

Today I am Free

     In honor of Veteran's Day, I would like to post a poem I wrote in 2009.

Today I am Free

Today I am free

to remember or forget

soldiers whose names I do not know,

who died in battles long ago

and those who perish yet,

in middle eastern sands

or other distant lands.

Today I am free 

to berate or celebrate

the USA will all its flaws,

unfair taxes, unjust laws,

who excludes the God who made her great.

I fight government's grasping touch

because I have so much.

Today I am free

to honor or condemn,

to sit in safety and abhor

the very thought of death and war,

or proudly be American

like those who bought my liberty.

Today I am free.

Joint Venture

    I love to travel because seeing new places and meeting new people is my favorite kind of adventure.  Lately I haven't had to travel far from home to have new experiences because my joints have expanded my view of the world of orthopedics.  The first joint to mutiny was my left knee.  We have a long history of not getting along.  When I was nine, I was playing in a sawdust pit with my friend Lori.  Lori called me and I turned to look at her. My knee did not.  Lefty never forgave me for forgetting her and from that time on my kneecap dislocated at painful and inconvenient times, like the time it caused me to say a bad word on the library steps at Bible college. Because it didn't happen on the few occasions I was in a doctor's office as a child, my kneecap periodically went AWOL until I was 24.  At that time Lefty had a memorable blowout in the automatic door of a Safeway store in Broomfield, Colorado and refused to go back to its semi-functional state.  Though we had been married four years at the time I required surgery, my husband tried to return me to my dad on warranty. The  surgery worked and my kneecap stays put these days but has significant arthritis and, out of spite for many years of making up for Lefty's deficits, so does my right.
     For years now my body has been going downhill, no thanks to my knees who don't want to go down anything.  For the past few years I have been going downstairs backwards.  The good news is it doesn't hurt a bit that way, the bad news is it's a little awkward out in public.  Last month Lefty became unbending, literally, so the doctor gave me a cortisone shot.  It must work like a lobotomy for stiff necked joints because since then it has been cooperative and pain free.
    Unfortunately my left shoulder felt neglected so cranked the discomfort dial from being a minor "catch" sensation to a "gotcha", so I went back to the orthopedic urgent care I had visited two weeks before.  I was relieved to find out my rotator cuff was fine.  The diagnosis was bicep tendonitis.  Doesn't that sound athletic?  I'm tempted to have that embroidered on a shirt.  The treatment is Celebrex and physical therapy.  Celebrex--good times.  PT, not so much. I can view PT as personal torture, a pain test or God's perfecting technique--that part of the adventure is up to me.

Top Drawer

    Yesterday when my husband was out hunting, I was in the bedroom hunting through my dresser drawers.  Our bedroom furniture came with small, velvet lined top drawers.  I'm not sure what purpose they were intended for but, in our case, they function as sieves which skim the flotsam that rises to the top of the other drawers.  In other words they are green velvet lined junk drawers. Despite all the years I have spent years building a tolerance for disorder (drawer rhymes with ignore, not a coincidence), I was overcome by an urge to "straighten things up" while searching through the top drawer of my nightstand.  In minutes, I had thrown out a handful of things and organized the rest into usefulness.  I was so inspired I even vacuumed the linty detritus with small, battery powered vacuum made to clean crumbs off the tablecloth that I bought because it was shaped like a lamb.  I moved from there to my top left dresser drawer where I store freebees my husband gets from sales reps, an assortment of reading glasses, points club membership cards, etc.
     That left only the top right drawer to be transformed, the card drawer.  I make my own cards (computer program, not craft), so at the beginning of each month, I make all the cards I will need and store them in that drawer.  The other cards in the drawer are special ones that I have received.  I enjoy making, sending and receiving cards but, I am not particularly sentimental, after a decent viewing period I throw them away.  But there are a handful special enough to keep close at hand, the kind I like to go back and reread.  I have nearly every card Reed has ever given me stored away in the basement.  Most of the ones tucked in the dresser are from my sons, scraps of spartan sentimentality a mother so longs to receive, especially when the relationship road has been rocky.  Tracy went through a difficult period when he turned 14.  Will's difficult period was from ages 2 to 17.  Those cards and notes make those "muddle" ages worthwhile.  My daughter loves me too, but she expresses it by remodeling our house and that is really hard to fit in a drawer. 
     I reread each card, discarding none, and stacked them neatly in the top right drawer, the green velvet lined drawer where I keep love.

Jobs I Should Never Have

     In the course of my roughly 40 years of employment, with lots of gaps for child rearing, I have had many different jobs.  Many of them were office jobs, which is somewhat surprising because, in spite of two years of high school office related classes, I am a very slow typist (ancient form of keyboarding).  What I should have gone into had I known myself better was nursing.  In my thirties I worked as a nurse aide at the hospital and currently work in home health care.  I love older people and giving them the assistance they need to stay in their own home, rather than a nursing home, is very gratifying.  My most satisfying and challenging career was being a mother, but I was downsized after 23 years due to lack of head count.  I had the privilege of being a stay-at-home mom (laughable misnomer) and because my husband is finally making the good wages they promised him in aircraft mechanic school, I make my living mostly as a kept woman, very part time as a home health aide and wasting time trying to be a writer.
     There are a large number of jobs I am unqualified for, those requiring more than basic knowledge (this is on/this is off) of computers for example.  I know a little about a lot of things but there are no jobs under the heading "trivia". However, there are some careers at which I would be terminally incompetent.  I should never work at a craft store. It doesn't qualify me for a handicapped sticker, but I am a craft impaired person.  I can do one craft, knitting baby afghans.  For dozens of years I have knitted dozens of afghans all the same pattern.  The only thing that varies is the color of the yarn.  Not only am I incompetent at crafts, I am uninterested in crafts. The only suggestion I would be able to give a potential customer at a craft store is to buy whatever it is preassembled.  Since craft supplies are usually found at fabric stores and I think sewing machines were invented as instruments of torture--"Confess or we'll make you sew bridesmaid dresses.", I am totally unsuited for work at a fabric store.
     A second contraindicated career choice is anything to do with plants.  I am known as Connie Kevorkian in the plant world.  Occasionally well meaning people will give me a plant as a gift, not knowing they are consigning it to its doom.  I can almost hear the hushed herbal horror when it realizes where it is. "Nooo, not the Black Thumb!"  I have one houseplant, an African violet without the sense, or ability, to leave.  It seems to flourish from neglect and I am good at that.  My vegetable garden was one tomato plant whom I named Juan, as in juan and only.  Juan was well grown and had several good sized tomatoes on him when I got him so, even I, didn't have time to kill him before he produced.  For outdoor flowers I buy only annuals.  I do not cover them when the weather turns cold.  I want them to die.  Every living thing has a time to die, for plants that time comes when they get to my house.  Hiring me to work at a nursery would be like hiring Typhoid Mary to work at a rest home. 
     It no longer bothers me that there are things at which I am hopeless because there are many things I am good at, including apathy about my failures.  Besides, there are always jobs available for incompetent, apathetic individuals. They are called government jobs.
 

Radical Christianity

     When we lived in the Denver area, we attended a very conservative Baptist church. So conservative, in fact, that the older members were unwilling to expand outreach in case the church would outgrow the 75 year old facility.  Changing locations or significantly altering the building would have been unthinkable.  The pastor felt some remorse over not being able to evangelize, but wanted to be faithful to those who "stayed by the stuff".  The reference is from the life of David when some of his warriors were too tired to go to battle, but stayed behind to guard the loot of previous battles instead. One of the pastor's favorite songs was "The old book and the old faith are the rock on which I stand. . ."  While that fit in well with the old building and old membership, I remember thinking how radical Christianity seemed to the religious conservatives of the time the church was beginning.
     This year in BSF we are studying Acts and I am struck again with the brash clash between the newborn church and centuries of Jewish tradition.  Though God's plan of salvation through faith in Christ has been in place since the beginning of time, 2000 years ago the old book and the old faith were written in Hebrew.  To the conservative Jews of the time, the doctrines of freedom from the Mosaic law and Gentiles as equals within the church were daring and possibly dangerous.
    It's easy, and much more enjoyable to figure what other people are doing wrong but I, too, have been susceptible to the desire to canonize my long held opinions and  TWIDT, The Way I Do Things. I am a big believer in tradition, but if tradition trumps teachability, it is simply well ordered sin. Now that the canon of scripture is complete, radical Christianity is not about changing doctrines, but it is still about changing lives.  I should be standing on the rock, but not with my hands in my pockets. If my life isn't being radically changed, I might as well be under the rock.

Hearing Roddy

     We didn't learn my little brother Roddy was hearing impaired until he was six years old.  A wave of retroactive shame washed over the family as we thought about all the times we had yelled at him or complained about his "not paying attention."  Hearing aids at that time, at least for little boys, were worn in a pocket strapped to the chest, with a long cord reaching to the earpiece.  It was an improvement, but primitive by modern standards.  About four years later, Rod received his first behind-the-ear hearing aid, which opened for him a whole new world of sounds.  Roddy had never before heard a toilet flush, and enjoyed it so much he spent part of that day flushing it over and over.  That was also the day he learned that the telephone made a sound even when it wasn't ringing or no one was talking on it.  He had never before heard the steady hum of the dial tone.  The first time he heard it, he pulled the hearing aid from his ear, handed it to me, and said, "Connie, listen."  His first impulse was to share this exciting new sound with me, who for all my 14 years had never given it a thought.  I remember it so well because that was the day Roddy began to hear--and I began to see.
     Here is a poetic look at the same story:

         Hearing Roddy

On the day Roddy exchanged
his better-than-nothing,
chest mounted, hearing aid
for the new
behind-the-ear model,
he heard, for the first time,
the toilet flush
the dial tone hum.

Excitement in his voice,
he handed me the earpiece
and said, "Connie, listen."
And, for the first time,
I really did.

Alone in Neverland

    Yesterday I was devastated to discover that I had forgotten a tradition that had been so important when the kids were growing up--pumpkin faced sugar cookies.  Shortly before Halloween I always made pumpkin shaped sugar cookies with jack-o-lantern faces.  We have been out of homemade cookies for a couple days, which is a tragedy all by itself, and I had been mulling over what kind to make.  It wasn't until my niece came over after school and we began to talk about upcoming Halloween activities that I realized I had totally forgotten the tradition.  When our daughter married and moved to Minnesota, I paid ridiculous postage to mail Halloween sugar cookies to her because I couldn't bear for her to not be part of the family tradition. (Although it was a relief not to eat the malevolent faced cookies she used to decorate.)  Now, all the children are gone from home and my carefully cultivated traditions are dying of neglect.  I still want very much to keep the traditions, I just don't know who I am keeping them for.  An innocuous cookie fired an arrow of emptiness right into my heart.
     I am afraid that the hole in my heart since my children left home will never close, and I am afraid that it will close, and I will lose the magic to the mundane.  Will the mystery of being out after dark turn to fear of stumbling? Will I start going to bed early on the 4th of July so I won't be disturbed by the fireworks?  Will leaf piles cease to be for jumping and hiding in and only represent work?  Am I alone in Neverland?
     I grew up starving for a chance to make some occasions stand apart from the ordinary days, but my childhood attempts were always sabotaged by my mother's mental illness. If I couldn't erase the bad memories I could, at least, bury them under layers of good ones with my own children.  My children are grown, my niece and nephew growing up, the memories are fading.  Now I know why I am so sad.  I have nothing new to put between me and the bad memories.  Once again writing has become my cheap therapist.
     But if I am alone in Neverland, I still choose to be making cookies.  My children appreciated the traditions, but they did not begin them and their growing up should not end them.  Perhaps in Neverland memories can be made out of cookie dough.  Maybe the magic of motherhood is not in having children, maybe it is in me.

Autumn Leaves

     I wrote this poem last fall, but didn't want to publish it until the leaves were actually falling (as if I could be sued for false advertising).  Now that a regular rain of foliage is falling, I feel free to share.

  Autumn Leaves

Autumn leaves

bare, branched bones,

bright colored foliage,

suddenly blown

neither needing, nor needed by, the tree

Free.

Autumn leaves

turning pages

books opened by

junior sages

needing to learn, but desiring to be

Free.

Autumn leaves

empty homes

college bound children,

suddenly grown

leaving their parents, each learning to be

Free.

Autumn leaves

fields at rest,

harvest is gathered,

pantries blessed,

quiet beneath nature's cold canopy

Free.

 

Brighten the Corner Where You Aren't

     Alternate title:  Let the Lower Lights Be Burning
    The basement bedroom in our house was the most coveted by my children because it has an attached bathroom (after our daughter's time), is as large as the master bedroom and, most importantly, is a whole floor away from the master bedroom.  When Will was the favored resident, he chronically left the light in the family room on when he went to bed. I could understand that. Since the only switch for that light was at the top of the stairs, shutting it off meant stumbling down the stairs in the dark to go to bed.  It became a nightly ritual for Reed or me to shut off the basement light before going to bed. However, by the time of Tracy's reign in the pine paneled palace, we had rewired the family room so there was a switch to shut the light off at the bottom of the stairs.  Problem solved, but nothing changed.  Every night we still found the family room light on.
     Eventually Tracy left home and there was no one occupying the basement bedroom.  That is when I discovered that leaving a light on had become an official requirement in our home because Reed exchanged being the person who shut lights off for the position of Light Leaver On-er.  It has been more than a year since Tracy moved out and I still have to shut the basement light off if, for any reason, Reed has been downstairs. If he hasn't been in the basement, he leaves the computer room light on.  He tells me he does it because he will be going back in there later.  Apparently he means later in the week.  I have tried to convince him that modern light bulbs do not require warming up, they will come on again the second he flips the switch, but to no avail.  I usually accompany Reed when he travels, but I suppose on those occasions when I am alone at night, I really should leave a light on somewhere.  It will be a dark day when I switch off an official family tradition.

Resistance Is Not Futile

     This thought was inspired by Curves, not the Borg. Yesterday I worked out at Curves for the first time since my knee malfunctioned. I was supposed to take it easy with my left knee for a week and a half following the cortisone shot--my new bfft, best friend for temporary. Not to be left out in the cold is my left shoulder, which has been doing its own version of the pain and stiffness maneuver both before and after the knee rebellion.   Since both my knee and shoulder were being obstinate, I didn't do the computerized routine that increases the hydraulic resistance, so yesterday's work out was more '"out" than "work".  I not only didn't break a sweat, I didn't even bend one.  Using the machines without the Curves Smart tag had about the same benefit as not exercising at all.
     That's where resistance comes in.  I've admitted many times in this blog that I am partial to easy but, if I'm going out of my way to stop and exercise, I would like my heart rate to be higher when I'm finished exercising than it was on the drive over.  Resistance is not futile. Resistance makes exercise worthwhile. Maybe that is why God doesn't give us all easy, downhill paths on our long circuit to heaven. In order to keep us from becoming spiritually flabby, He allows a controlled amount of resistance to make us stronger. If I can trust an inanimate computer at Curves not to push me harder than I can bear, how hard should it be to trust the God who loves me to program my life for the greatest challenge and benefit. If I want my heart to rate with God, what I need to resist is the path of least resistance. Whether we are working out our body or our salvation, if we aren't facing any resistance, it is an "exercise" in futility.

Easy Writer

     I just submitted my first story to a magazine for publication.  I am so far out of my comfort zone I will need a GPS to relocate it. It's not just that having something published would validate my skills as a writer, it would make me feel a lot better about all the time I waste writing if it were actually a marketable product.  My goal is to submit something somewhere every week until I run out of material.  That should not take long. The story I sent was of the human interest/true/Christian/humor genre so I submitted it to a Christian/senior/90% freelance/pays actual $ magazine.
     I have also been "honing my craft" for my pretend profession by attending classes.  This week I took a lunch hour comma class.  I've had this suspicion that I am overcommaing and I would like to overcome that.  It turns out I have been doing them correctly for the most part but now I have the comma rules to know why I've been doing them correctly.  The next lunch hour class is on getting organized to write.  I'm not sure if I am writer enough to need the class, it's not as if editors are making demands, but anything that makes writing easier sounds good to me.  My college major was in Easy. I am not sure where to go from here with my writing, even in this blog.
     

Anger and Andy

     The poetry class I am taking is continuing ed., meaning nongraded. Therefore, though the instructor is free to give assignments, I am also free to ignore them.  But I gave myself an assignment. Since nearly all of my poems have come out of my own experience, my goal was to write a fiction poem. I found it interesting and challenging.  Two verses into this poem about an unopened package, I realized I had no idea what was in the package. Modern poetry is often abstract, but it still seemed like a good idea for the author to know what was coming next.  This is what came next:

          Anger and Andy

All through the years he had wondered
what was in the package
but he had never opened it,
partly out of spite,
partly fear
that the pain of her leaving
would come back to him.
It was better to stay angry.
Anger had kept him company
these nine years
constant as a friend
or, at least, a drinking buddy.
They had done a lot of that together--
Anger and Andy.

But  the package tormented him, sitting there
in all its brown smugness, looking down
on him the way she had.
There was no more money
for liquor tonight,
not even beer.
So Anger did Andy one last favor
before he left for the night
to keep company with some other drunk.
Together they torn open the package,
the mocking memory of his marriage,
tore it to pieces.

A picture fell to the ground
his son, in a broken frame,
the mangled memory of his murder.
Torn to pieces
when he went through the windshield
as the car nosed into the ground
because his drunken father
was angry for having to do the favor
of picking his son up that night
when his wife normally did.
He'd had only beer,
no hard liquor.
He thought he was sober enough
to look after his only child.
Tormented he remembered

looking down at the small brown coffin
a package forever unopened.
Nine years she had stayed away;
his wife would never come back to him.
She left behind only the package--
and Anger
Anger and Andy.

Never for Donny

     I'm not sure why I usually don't publish a poem on this blog until after I have had it critiqued in my poetry class.  Everything else I write is off the cuff, and I don't even wear cuffs.  But we didn't have poetry class this week because a visiting author was holding a book reading.  I am proud to say our poetry class was well represented, which was a good thing, since few others attended.  Because of this event, the two poems I wrote during my muse mugging last week have been hiding in my nightstand while I have been stumped for subjects to blog about.   So today I will publish one that, with or without a critique, pleases me. A person who knows me well enough to read this blog will understand who this is about.

            Never for Donny

She wasn't sure what she was supposed to do
she was a big sister, not a mother,
she had no grown up wisdom to share.
So she let him rest his head on her shoulder while he cried.
She wished she could tell him
everything would be alright
but she couldn't,
she couldn't make everything alright.

He couldn't hold it in all the time--
the way he got treated  because he was different.
He had been born different.
She could make the neighborhood kids
and her own friends
treat him like a normal person--
not call him RE tard,
but she couldn't control what happened in school.
So she just let him cry
big, sloppy tears on her shoulder
and tried not to get upset about the snot on her shirt.
She could clean that up later.

The tears would dry.
She and Donny would start teasing and fighting again.
Everything would go back to normal
except for Donny--
never for Donny.

Bio Hazard

     My assignment for my third and final Freelance Writing class this week is to write a bio.  One needs to be two to three paragraphs the other, two to three sentences.  You would think this to be a fairly easy assignment, there is no one I know better than me, but I am struggling as if it was quantum physics.  The first hurdle is in identifying myself as a writer; this statement would not hold up in court.  Until now being a writer has been my own private hope and delusion; committing that to paper is intimidating.  The other hurdle is that I want to make it funny and I'm pretty sure that isn't appropriate.  When Will was in high school he frequently received the following comments on his assignments from his kind English teacher, Mrs. Wilson,  "Very good Will, but this was actually not supposed to be humorous".  Apparently I have the same problem and if I seriously want to be published, I should write a serious bio since they are presented as if coming from the editor.  My Facebook philosophy is "If I can't say something funny, don't say anything at all".  That is usually my blog philosophy also, come to think of it, that is my life philosophy.
     With neither humor nor writing credentials my 55 year bio fits in one sentence.  "Connie Lamb is a writer (wannabe) who lives in Kalispell, Montana with her husband."  By Wednesday night I need to get a life.  I have serious problems being serious.

Strange or Passing Through?

     As I was coming home from jiggling my curves at Curves today I saw a box turtle crossing Woodland Avenue.  Apparently it was misled by the name, Woodland Ave. is not actually in the woods, it is one of the main roads across town.  The speed limit is only 25 mph but I am guessing that exceeds turtle speed by quite a stretch.  So I pulled over in the Jehovah's Witness parking lot (God will understand) and retrieved the turtle.  It hissed when I picked it up, meaning this turtle was a female.  I learned years ago that female turtles hiss, males grunt (much like their human counterparts).  Regretfully I didn't learn this fact until after the demise of my pet turtle whom I had inaptly named Sam.  I carried the unnamed female across the street to the grass on the other side where she could walk quite a ways before encountering a road, and it was all downhill.  Even a turtle should make better time walking downhill.  For all I know she turned around and headed right back into the road, but rescuing the turtle was still the right thing to do.
     I mention this not just to show how kind I am, or even to tie in this great title I thought of days ago, but to segue into earlier blog entries about our spare sons, the homeless boys who lived with us over a two year period.  Many questioned the wisdom of letting virtual strangers share our home (when I put it like that it does sound a little crazy), letting them have access to our possessions and hearts.  And I admit I wondered at times what good it would do when there are so many more wanderers out there and when they had already been so badly damaged, but I comfort myself with knowing I shared God's word with all of them.  What God does from there is His business.  Rescuing them was the right thing to do. 
    Most of the people we encounter in life are strangers, many are downright strange and all of us are only passing through, maybe the good we do for those who cross our paths doesn't change their lives, but it is still the right thing to do.  It changes us.

10 Things I Will Never Hear My Husband Say

 1.  I think we should talk.
 2.  No, I don't like your haircut.
 3.  Yes, that does make you look fat.
 4.  This isn't how mom made it.
 5.  Give me your honest opinion.   (He never needs to ask.)
 6.  Why can't you be more like your sister?
 7.  Don't take things so seriously.
 8.  Try a bite of what I ordered.
 9.  That was really clever.
10.  You were right.  I was wrong.

10 Things I Will Never Say to My Husband

1.   You look good in that suit.   (Because he will not be wearing one.)
2.   Thanks for sharing your feelings.
3.   You planned this just for me!
4.   What's that cologne you have on?
5.   Where did you buy that nice (insert clothing item)? (He relies on a personal shopper--me.)
6    Why don't you see what's on the other channels?
7.   Wow! You cleaned out your car/truck.  (He has to make room for even one passenger, no matter how many seats in the vehicle.)
8.   You've held that baby long enough.
9.   What's for dinner?
10.  Did you have a good time at the wedding?

Thorny

     The apostle Paul said God gave him a thorn in the flesh to keep him humble.  Nothing God has given me thus far in my life has made me humble, but the method God seems to use most often on my long journey to humility is humiliation. Either I do something incredibly stupid or thoughtless or I forget to do something even a stupid or thoughtless person would think of.  Despite regular occurrences of the aforementioned incidents, my humble pie is taking a long time to bake. I do however have a thorn in the flesh or, in my case, a barb in the brain--migraine headaches.  Harmonizing the existence of pain with the goodness of God is a puzzle for far greater minds than mine.  All I know is that the same pain which our Enemy would use to distract and discourage us is what God uses to focus and grow us.
     I have come up with five things I have learned from my seasons of pain, alliterated because that is just more fun.  Pain teaches me to:
     Pay attention:  When I am looking to God for answers, I am more likely to be listening.
     Prioritize:  If I only have a certain amount of productive time, I need to spend it well.  I am amazed to discover  the world does not come to an end when Competent Connie isn't up to running it.
     Pathos:  I can not only empathize with other migraineurs (headache professionals) but with anyone suffering.
     Perception:  Sometimes I need to push through the pain, sometimes I need to rest.  Knowing which method is called for requires the usually overlooked skill of listening to my body. 
     Patience:  I hate learning patience. None of the things that teach us patience are pleasant: helplessness, waiting etc.  I heard a woman tell how she used to pray for patience, six children later she recognized the pattern and stopped.  Patience is a bummer but it comes in handy, mostly to the people who live with us.
     I have also found that between my dislocating kneecap in childhood, three natural births and migraines I have developed a really high pain tolerance and that comes in handy as well, but it doesn't start with a "P" and I was not attempting to make an exhaustive list because of the idea of exhaust.  Being exhausted gives me a migraine.  I can buy thornless raspberry plants or roses, but I prefer my life the way God has given it--thorns and all. 
 

Told You So, Fido

     It happened exactly as I feared.  I took my aging dog for an extended walk this beautiful autumn afternoon, to a place by the river where we hadn't been in a while. I was both sad and glad to see that Garth wasn't attempting to follow his accustomed path down the six foot high bank to the water because I knew he wasn't strong enough to climb the steep path back up.  I thought Garth knew that too.  I was wrong.  After he had enjoyed his drink and swim he got out on the bank, looked at the slope, then went back into the water.  I think he was attempting with all the unsubtle subtlety of a dog to look casual while to tried to figure a way out of this mess.  I'm fine.  Still a little thirsty, but it's all under control.
     So I laid down at the edge of the muddy bank in the clean clothes I had put on that morning and reached down as he made yet another casual circuit into the river.  Garth is now deaf and never was very bright, but even he could not misunderstand that I wanted him to get as high as he could on the bank where I could grab him by the collar and pull him out.  Going to the water's edge myself and pushing him out was a last resort since it was very muddy and it was quite likely that I wouldn't be able to climb the steep bank either.  I had my cell phone with me, but I really didn't want to become one of the amusing law enforcement anecdotes that get published in the paper.
     Realizing his casual cover was blown, Garth finally came close enough to my outstretched hands for me to pull him up the bank.  Fortunately, since he is both deaf and a dog, I got to say the "I told you so" that I so long to say to my loved ones, but usually manage to hold in.  I stopped by the river in the first place so Garth could rest for the return trip.  He is having a hard time adjusting to the limitations of old age; I must do the adapting for him.  There is a lesson in that for me as Reed and I see our parents aging. Once again I have learned an important from a teacher who licks his privates in public.  At least dogs have the good grace never to say "I told you so".

All Dressed Up

     This poem was inspired by a particularly particular home care client, the buzz word now is consumer, which I consider inappropriate, our clients don't eat us, except in this case.  "Roxanne" consumed my time, patience and love of old people.  Fortunately she moved on to "bless" another home care provider.

     All Dressed Up

The first thing I do when I arrive at Roxanne's
is retrieve the appropriate pair of shoes
from the stacks of shoe boxes in her closet,
with the tissue still inside.

Next we go into the bathroom
where I spray and pin her carefully arranged hair.
I fasten her chosen selection of necklaces and bracelets
while she puts on her freshly sanitized earrings.

Then I help her select a jacket
from the two dozen in her coat closet.
It is hard for me to help match
her outfit to her jacket
since I only have four to choose from at home.

She hands me the bag with her curlers and brushes
to take to the beauty shop.
Only her own will do.
All the while she is humming
a light hearted melody
that seems out of place.

Finally ready, I help her into my car.
I am paid to transport her
because the friends who used to
don't come around anymore
and her children seldom call.
She has no idea why.

We drive directly to the beauty shop,
a one chair affair attached to the stylist's home.
The first thing the stylist does is remove the pins
and wash out the hairspray.
No other customers will be coming while Roxanne is there.

All dressed up. . .

Danger Will Robinson!

     Two poems last night, one today, second chapter of a story I wrote years ago.  The writing frenzy is growing worse.  Danger, Will Robinson.  Danger.

                         Taking Turns

I wonder as I watch them coming into Sykes,
our local reincarnation of an old fashioned general store--
the old farmer with the bowed back
perpetually looking at the floor,
the widow who can only walk
with her feet turned out at angles
like flippers. 
When did they decide it was time to be old?
Did they wake up one morning
and say, "Today I will stop trying
to straighten my back
or walk like other people?
From now on I will shuffle my feet
or wear checks and stripes together
or stop fixing my hair"?
Will I do that?
How will I know when it is my turn?

I like them all,
the ladies with pink, penciled on eyebrows
the men wearing belts with suspenders,
both in sweaters on 90 degree days.
But I wonder who will smile indulgently at me
when I come in wearing a pearl necklace
over a sweatshirt?
Will they wonder
like me
when it will be their turn?
 

Starlight Summons

     This poem is the second of three views of the same event about which I wrote "Contemplating Coals". The third poem was the four liner I posted on Facebook titled "Memorable Moment".  I didn't realize until class last night that all three versions had two word, alliterated titles.  I have been doing homiletics too long, apparently I unconsciously alliterate.  That is a little scary, but not as much as sleepwalking naked would be.  Whereas "Contemplating Coals" was rated E for everyone and "Memorable Moment"--fb for Facebook, this version is rated M for mature, not for anything raunchy, I think the best love scenes imply without describing intimacy, but simply because a child wouldn't get the meaning.

Starlight Summons

In a firepit dug by their now-grown son,

alone, because the neighbors couldn't come,

he built a fire for just the two of them.

They sat and stared together at the flames.

The music from her laptop masked the sound

of traffic from the highway into town.

In silent conversation, mind to mind,

they shared the gift of rare, unhurried time.

When all her other senses had been fed

her thoughts strayed from the embers to her bed.

"You tired?" he asked, as she rose up to go.

With twinkling eyes she turned and told him "No".

Her Views

                    Her Views

 

 From her well kept, two story house

with its sedate, suburban views of Denver

and its two car garage,

   housing two, late model sedans,

from nicely appointed rooms

with portraits of her 

newly deceased soul mate,

   with whom she started out with nothing

   sixty four years ago,

and two loving daughters,

   one of whom miraculously survived

   a nearly fatal car wreck,

her two grown grandsons

and her three great grandchildren,

as we prepared

   from her well supplied pantry

   food for the funeral guests

      she explained,

  that she told the minister

  not to mention God too much

  because

        he hadn't been good to her family.

Poetry Class

    Only an idiot would curse themselves, but I did so by enrolling in a poetry class.  Now I am thinking in poetry.  After finally recovering from my thyroid inspired fit of poetry, I have enjoyed several years of being able, but not compelled, to write poetry.  Since I can write the words but no longer remember the "rules" of poetry, I enrolled in a continuing ed. (aka non graded) poetry class at our community college.  At the first class I learned than this is not a technical class teaching form, meter and whatever else I have forgotten about poetry; it is a performance class in which we create, read and critique poetry.  I wasn't worried about creating poetry, I have a nursery full of my homely brain children at home, but there was no warning label that taking this class could cause unwanted thoughts of "poetryside".  It is not so much the sensation of being inspired, it is more like being mugged by my muse, robbed of time and brain cells that could be much better spent on useful things, like where I parked the car at the mall. Ever since my thyroid's revenge I have felt like I am going along, minding my own business when out of nowhere thoughts invade my brain and demand to be written down.  Prose is time consuming, poetry painfully slow.
     And now this blog, my reliable refuge when the writing rant comes over me, will be infected with poems as well.  An innocent, but self inflicted injury.  No longer just coping tools to purge personal pain, this poetic world view will probably inspire insipid verse and I will blog them all--the good, the bad and the ugly, encouraged by my classmates kind critiques.  So I will do what my class did not:
     Warning:  This blog may lead to unwanted thoughts of poetry.  Read it and weep!

Contemplating Coals

Contemplating Coals

Sunflower silhouettes against a starry sky

the petals perish, yet the stalks reach high.

Spouses snuggle around the fireside warmth,

their bodies aging, yet their love glows still.

You and I silent, in the garden, contemplating coals,

embers now, where once the flames gave light,

will warm our way into the deepening night.

Immaculate Perception

     I haven't done an exhaustive study on this (I won't do an exhaustive study on anything unless I'm getting paid for it, mainly because of the word exhaust) but I have noticed that people with immaculate homes are annoyed by things that don't bother the rest of us.  Their houses are spotless because they not only spot the spots, but their existence bothers them enough to do something about it.  I, however, may notice and even disapprove of  the presence of, for instance, cobwebs in my home but I generally don't notice them unless I am sitting down and it's hard to remedy the situation and remain sitting down.  I subscribe to Chuck Swindoll's philosophy--Don't sweat the small stuff, followed by, it's all small stuff.
     I would like to think that the trade off for having a less than immaculate home is that I don't come unglued when my husband tracks in the freshly mown lawn or puts greasy car parts on my kitchen counter because being particular about housecleaning and particular about everything else seems to be a package deal.  Fussiness appears to be a trait that cannot be confined to only one aspect of life.  In the early years of our marriage when we were living in small apartments I dusted the inside of the china cabinet and degreased the jars in the spice rack on a monthly basis, but when our first child was 8 months old I had an epiphany.  One morning as I was setting our daughter on our clean living room carpet that was nonetheless covered with a baby blanket and the two toys I selected for her to play with, I realized that pursuing a controlled, orderly life meant she would have a miserable childhood.  She would soon be crawling off that blanket and picking more than two toys at a time and I could make both our lives miserable or I could lighten up and enjoy the chaos.  I chose to lighten up.  For me the road less traveled by was a dirt road and it has made all the difference.
     I decided the world would not end if I let the kids spin the swivel chair in circles (why else would they make them that way?).  When we bought our current house I was delighted to see it had single walls by the fireplace and kitchen that would be fun for children to run around.  Sofa cushions are ideally suited for building forts.  Dog hair is nontoxic.  I select carpeting and furniture based mostly on its dirt hiding potential.  I will never be awarded the Good Housekeeping seal, but I have been rewarded by hearing from visitors that my home is welcoming and comfortable.  Immaculately clean is too close to sterile for my comfort.  If God made the planet out of dirt and man out of dust who are we to disapprove of it? 

Touchy Subject

     This is the second time I am opening my blog with the disclaimer that this is not going to be as raunchy as it sounds (not a good sign), but the truth is I have always been a disappointment to my husband in bed.  Stay with me, it gets better.  I can't have anything touching me when I fall asleep or I have nightmares.  My husband happens to fall in the category of anything.  As far as I know I have always been this way.  When I was a little girl, I carefully took all my stuffed animals out of my bed before I could go to sleep.  This is a great disappointment to my husband, who finds me both irresistible and untouchable at the same time.  Once I am deeply asleep he is welcome to touch me but, of course, I cannot tell him that and he tell can't tell by looking what stage of sleep I am in.  I asked a counselor about it once, he told me he doesn't put much stock in the significance of dreams but he thought it was probably significant.  Maybe my older brother tried to smother me in my sleep when I was too little to remember.  I know there were plenty of times I wanted to smother him.
     For whatever reason I am cursed with something like the Midas touch except it only happens when I am falling asleep, someone else has to touch me, and I don't get anything shiny out of it.  I guess it's more like the Minus touch.  Untouchable makes a great movie title or television series but it's kind of pain in real life, especially the bed part of real life.  Snuggle will remain my fabric softener and not my sleeping condition.  I'm having a hard time finishing this blog.  Guess it doesn't want to be wrapped up either.

Not of This World

     On March 25, 1960 my younger brother was entering this world in a small hospital in the small town of Philipsburg, Montana.  The doctor who delivered him was not competent enough to recognize how much distress the baby was in.  He suffered from a condition called erythroblastosis fetalis, Rh factor, in which a mother with Rh negative blood has a slight blood transfer with her baby's Rh positive blood.  The mother's body reacts by producing antibodies against the perceived threat, even when the threat is her baby.  The sensitivity builds gradually and seldom affects first or second pregnancies.  Roddy was the third child.  He was left with speech and hearing problems, spasticity, mental retardation.  The damage was irreversible.
     On October 8, 1962 as my sister was entering this world my mother was leaving it.  She was drawn into a world of danger, intrigue and secret conspiracies, the world of the paranoid schizophrenic.  Schizophrenia is not split personality, as in the T-shirt "I'm schizophrenic and so am I".  Schizophrenia is split thinking:  schizo=split phren=mind.  There is a breakdown in the way the mind processes information often causing hallucinations; the brain receives visual and auditory signals without outside stimuli.  It is as if your television turned itself on and began broadcasting its own channels.  Medications can mute the input but they cannot shut it off.  The disease was incurable.
     One might question the goodness of a God who would burden my father with both a handicapped son and a mentally ill wife, but there is a beautiful economy in God's purposes.  Because my mother was mentally ill, dad would spend most of his life alone in his marriage.  And because my brother was handicapped, he would spend most of his life with his dad.  Through all the lonely years they have had each other.  Isaiah 55:8,9 says:
     " For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the Lord.
       As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
God has a plan for everyone born into this world.  Often those plans don't make sense to us.  That is because the plans are not of this world.

No One to Play With

     For many years I have called my sister's children, Alex and Amanda, my transition team to bridge the gap between raising my own children and having grandchildren.  I married young and had all three of our children by the time I was 30.  My sister, who is six years younger than me, didn't marry until she was over 30.  (For a fee I will tell how much over 30.)  My kids were in their teens when my sister's were being born.  Unfortunately my niece and nephew have also succumbed to growing up, Alex is 13, Amanda 11, and the ship coming in with my grandchildren has not yet appeared on the horizon.
     I have been grateful not to be made a grandmother through the creative efforts of my unmarried sons like many of my acquaintances have.  I am also grateful that my daughter lacked that kind of creativity before marriage and while putting her husband through school. Now, after nearly eight years of marriage, they have decided to make a sequel  "Grad School (non) Musical " which alters the ETA of my future grandkids.  There are many reasons for wanting to have grandchildren: spiritual--I want to help pass the baton of faith to the next generation,  revenge--someday I hope you have children just like you,  selfish--you get to spoil them and give them back to their parents.  My reason--I want to have someone to play with.  That is why I look with such regret at the empty horizon and a transition team who will soon discover hanging out with their aunt is uncool; I am afraid I will have no one to play with.
     I don't intend to be one of those grandmas who has things to play with, I want to be a thing to play with.  I like coloring and pretending a blanket on the floor is a magic carpet.  I like making forts in the living room and in piles of leaves, making up silly songs and wishing on the first star of the evening.  I like imagining.  For example, on Sunday we were at Silverwood amusement park where my favorite ride is the Paratrooper.  On the first ride Amanda was with her mother and I rode by myself.  I noticed how much it was like swinging and was tempted to pump my legs as if it would go higher, but I was a 54 year old woman riding alone on the Paratrooper.  Toward the end of the evening while Reed and Alex were waiting in line for another ride, Amanda and I ran off to the Paratrooper.  I pretended to use Jedi mind tricks on the group of teens in front of us, "These are not the rides you're looking for", and they actually did leave to go home.  Perhaps I am a Jedi.  Amanda and I rode together pumping our legs, grossly describing what would happen if our seat broke free.  We named the stars--not the constellations--Herbie, Melvin things like that.  Simply put, we played.
     I was one of those girls often described as mature for my age.  This is code for a child forced to grow up too quickly by hard circumstances.  Maybe for that reason I didn't get playing out of my system, all I know is that I am tired of being mature for my age.  I'm not going to start singing "Puff, the Magic Dragon" at this point.  Maybe I'm just a girl who can't say grow, but the solution to the problem is simple--trust God.  That is the solution to everything. Trust His plan. Trust His timing. Trust His goodness. Meanwhile I'll play with the transition team as long as I can and just keep watching the horizon.

Gone to the Dogs

     Oh where, oh where has my little dog gone. Oh where oh where can he be?  I remember that song from my childhood.  I don't remember where the dog turned up in the tune, but I know where the dogs are now:  at the craft show, the concert, etc.  I have a dog and thoroughly enjoy his company at home or going to the island for walks where he can explore, sniff and pee to his heart's content, but Garth is no connoisseur of the finer things.  I wouldn't consider taking him to a concert, even before he went deaf, because he has no discernible appreciation for music.  Neither is Garth interested in art or craft shows.  He is a dog.  If I took him to those venues he would sniff, pee (or worse) and growl at other dogs because he is a dog and that's what dogs do.
     But I have noticed that in increasing numbers other people are bringing their dogs to these crowded, public events.  An outdoor concert is no longer an opportunity for humans to enjoy music, summer and nature at the same time, they have become an adult show-and-tell.  Apparently a pet themed show-and-tell.  One man staged a mini performance by standing up and putting his dog through a series of commands.  Most of the showing off is more subtle.
     Last weekend I attended a large craft show where a doberman (who knew they could be aggressive?) started after one of the many little mutts in attendance.  The owner gave it an earnest tongue lashing and threatened to leave it in the car.  Why didn't she do that in the first place?  What part of the craft show did she think the dog would enjoy?  Last night I was at a park for an evening concert when I smelled a noxious odor and then noticed a dog walking past.  No, it had not gone or worse in the near vicinity, that was just the way it smelled. It was definitely the most aromatic of the many music loving dogs at the park.  In past years at the concerts it was requested that dogs be left home because running children + dogs =  biting incidents and the parks department didn't want to be sued.  Also dog + dogs = barking, growling, fighting and dogs + grass= poop.  Unless these animals have remarkably strange home lives I am sure the owners have noticed this pattern of behavior. 
     It would take rather extensive/expensive training to teach a dog to pee (or worse) only on command, get along with all other dogs and never growl at running children not to mention teaching them music/art/craft appreciation.  It might be easier to train people to enjoy all dogs, stepping in poop and being growled at or bit but I have come up with an even simpler solution--take the dog to places where he can sniff, pee and other things he enjoys or LEAVE THE DOG HOME.  This country is not going to the dogs, the dogs are being chauffeured there by their owners. If you want your dog to appreciate culture, feed him yogurt or better yet, let sleeping dogs lie.  

18 Ocean View

     I was 18 when I first saw the ocean.  I grew up in Missoula and a river runs through it, several actually, but being from a non-swimming family my experiences were limited to throwing rocks in the water and wading.  Although there were several lakes not too far away I have very few memories of being at a lake.  So when I found out the first social activity of the year at my college in Oregon was a beach party I was thrilled.  I wondered how I would react.  I am by nature a reserved person and I didn't know anyone there well enough to let down my guard with anyway, but as we got near enough to the coast for me to see glimpses through the bus windows I started crawling over my classmates for a closer look.  I was entranced.  When we got out of the bus and I could experience the ocean with my other four senses it was even more magnificent.
     I had never seen such massive motion, it was as if the familiar mountains surrounding my Montana home had somehow come to life. I had never heard the roar of the ocean before, and yet it sounded familiar.  The vastness of the sea stretching from the Oregon horizon to merge with her sister seas and cover the planet made me feel as small as the grains of sand on the beach.  I knew within it's depths were fish of all sizes and descriptions, strange creatures, some still undiscovered, and nearby--whales.  All this combined with the power of the wind until I began to distinguish in the roaring waves the call of a mother, the call to come home.  The ocean calls us home because it is the sound of the womb, the first sounds any of us hear. A womb with a view.  Burial at sea now seemed more fitting than lonely.
     For the Christian there are many strange homecomings.  Through Christ we come to God only to discover He is our Father and that somewhere inside we knew all along that He should be.  We find a church home and discover that it is full of brothers and sisters from newborn to elderly.  We travel to distant places and feel an instant kinship with strangers with whom we have nothing in common except the Spirit.  And finally, we go one by one to the foreign beauty of heaven only to discover it has always been our real home.
     I waded in the cold water that September in Oregon though few others did.  They had seen the sea before.  We have made many trips since then to the rocky Oregon coast.  I have seen the northern Atlantic and enjoyed the warmth of the Gulf coast and occasionally swayed to the rocking chair motion of boats.  In Hawaii I even saw whales.  The first time I saw the ocean I wondered how I would react; it is the same to this day--with wonder.

Carping About Carpet

     I enjoy running (more like shuffling) around the house barefoot although my old feet have not only betrayed me, but demanded support, arch support.  I also don't mind being asked to take off my shoes at other people's houses, I'm comfortable that way, but I don't care if guests or residents wear their shoes in mine.  I'm all about comfort (ask anyone).  I want my guests to do whatever is most comfortable for them--shoes or no shoes.  My main reason for that is that I am running a home, not a carpet preserve.  I know a carpet gets more dirty and worn when people walk on it in shoes.  I want it to get dirty and worn.  In ten years I will be tired of the carpet and want to replace it, but I am biologically wired not to replace anything until the old one is broken.  Unless someone's boots are tracking in mud or manure, tracking in dirt is just contributing to the cause of someday getting new carpet.  You're welcome.
     Wood floors are very popular now but that doesn't solve the floor problem.  Many people are so fussy about their wood floors you would think they have to be cleaned with platinum.  Some of them are so protected with rugs you can't even see the wood much less get it dirty, like those (reportedly) beautiful wood tables that owners perpetually cover with pads or tablecloths.  If no one will ever see the wood you might as well save your money and buy press board.  But, to get off the table and on the floor, I prefer carpet.  Our home didn't come with buried hardwood floors that just need refinishing; we would have to start from square (foot) one.
     My daughter prefers to put wood and tile in the houses they remodel because they have two dogs and carpet, although/because the dogs love it, gets nasty in no time.  But as we have seen in our rooms with tile, vinyl etc. the dog hair just rolls itself into fanciful clumps and hides under the furniture.  It's still there and even more alarming in bunny size.  I prefer carpet because, unless you have a heated floor, it is warmer.  This is Montana.  Warm trumps pretty.  Yes, the carpet collects dog hair, but that just makes it warmer.  When we bought carpet for our first home, a trailer (we were too poor to call it a mobile home) in Helena , we were smart enough to buy a remnant that matched the dog we had at the time.  You can reverse this process if you are between dogs and match the dog to your carpet but you may have to avoid the more bizarre shades of carpet. You should probably do that anyway, no matter what the decorating programs or polite guests tell you, bizarre is ugly.
     So feel free to walk in my house in your shoes--or even mine.  The carpet is there for the comfort and convenience of the people in the home, not the other way around.

Life--condensed version

     I think everyone at some point in their life should have a dog.  This is not just because of how good it feels to come home to someone who greets us ecstatically and adores everything we say and do, or even because talking to the dog doesn't seem as strange as talking to ourselves .  People should have a dog because dogs show us life--the condensed version.  Remember those Reader's Digest abridged books?  They could fit three classic books in the amount of pages the author allotted for one.  Dogs, in their brief span on earth, have a lot to teach us about life.
     Thirteen years ago when our dog, Garth, was a puppy he followed us around like a . . .well, you know.  When he was in his toddler phase and we took him for a walk he stayed close by our heels because that was where he felt safe, much like any preschooler.  A couple months later when Garth was in his "teens" he ran ahead, regardless of what we told him.  He was satisfied with occasional glances back in our direction just to make sure we were around somewhere. Sound familiar?  This was followed by many happy years of companionship with our adult dog.  That is the stage of life Reed and I are in now, enjoying our grown children.
    But Garth is now in his late life stage. He has a hard time getting his hips off the floor.  Sometimes he will leave a tossed chunk of food laying on the carpet rather than get up, a sacrifice that would have been unthinkable before.  Garth is now stone deaf and has nearly lethal breath. The white on his muzzle is spreading to the top of his head.  He has grown a bumper crop of fatty tumors.  He still loves going for walks but lags further and further behind.  When I wait for him to catch up, he seems embarrassed.  He pants for quite a while after we get home and drinks a lot of water.  I have begun to shorten our morning walks.
     What have I learned from a non-English speaking teacher one fourth my age? Besides seeing 70 plus years of human life condensed into little over a decade, I have learned cleanliness is next to loneliness, not godliness.  The companionship of a pet more than makes up for the hair.  It is important to stop and smell the roses (and everything else) as we pass through life.  The same old routine can be exciting if you have enough imagination (poor pattern recognition and/or minimal intelligence).  Now that Garth is deaf and we both suffer from arthritic knees, I learn that the goodness of life is not about what we can do, it's about who we have.  When Garth dies we will learn anew to grieve and move on to love again.  A  dog's love is not undying, but it is unconditional.  If unconditional love is all we learn from our pet's condensed life, it is more than enough.

Me Time

     It seems fast food commercials are trying to make us selfish: "Have it your way.", "Be good to yourself.", and now "Me time".  I don't think this is a sentiment we need to encourage.  If your me is anything like my me, 70 percent of the time is "me time" and that is only because for the other 30 percent we are asleep.  That doesn't mean that I'm giving myself a treat (in this case, McDonald's iced coffee) on a minute by minute basis, but even when I am working or doing something for other people, I am still thinking about me.  This is not an anomaly, it is the normal human condition.  Ego centrism is present in newborns who may never in their lifetime learn the term.  It is a good thing for babies to know and communicate what they want or they wouldn't survive infancy.  The problem is we never really outgrow it.  Having commercials reminding us to be good to ourselves is about as necessary as having doctors remind us to breathe and swallow. 
     I'm not a total narcissist.  I work part time in home health as a caregiver--the real kind, not the marijuana kind.  I enjoy my job because I think old people are the bomb, but that doesn't mean there aren't some for whom I wish I had a bomb, including one I shop for voluntarily.  I enjoy sharing the hospitality of my home, especially the part where I get to feed people. Food is my love language.  If you eat my food, you are accepting my love.  I actually enjoy a pleasure more if I get to share it, especially with someone who might not have that opportunity otherwise.  My conscious intention is to use my resources, especially time, for Christ but my default drive is set to "me time".  So is yours.
     God has given us many good things to make our time on earth enjoyable and it would be foolish and ungrateful refuse his gifts.  So go ahead and give yourself that treat.  But let's be honest, it's always Me Time. 

Something More

     There was more to him than the blond hair and long, red beard I noticed when I first met him that January day.  More to him than the too slender build and pale complexion that made me think he had been a sickly child.  He had more to share than the few sentences we exchanged on our long, first trip together when he gave me a ride back to college.  In the months to come I would learn that he had the persistence to keep loving me in spite of numerous rejections, and in spite of me.  So, in spite of myself, I began to return his love.  There is something irresistible about someone who loves you.
     It was not love at first sight, or second, or even tenth.  There was more to it than that.  And, having found something more, I have wanted nothing more.

My Heart to Break

     Apart from being a victim of violent crime or weather, there are few things in life that leave you as vulnerable as loving someone.  For that reason most of us station guards around our hearts to keep out all intruders.  That is why I was both amazed and frightened to realize I loved one of my spare sons as much as my own children.  I knew he would break my heart, not by his alcoholism or many other faults, but by leaving me.  I knew from the moment I met Lance that he was the kind who walks away.  Everything I learned about his life only made this more certain, but it was too late.  God had bonded us together, it was too late to call the guards, my wall had already been breached. When he left our house for the last time two years and four months later, it was almost a relief.  At least the waiting was over.  I knew how to lose someone I loved, that was sadly familiar territory.
     In God's recycling program experiences are never wasted.  In October 2008 I came down with Grave's disease of the thyroid, on Thanksgiving Day Lance left, in mid December I had my overactive thyroid irradiated and in a one of a kind reaction to that, began writing poetry.  By the time it became apparent I was not going to hear from Lance, I had poetry as an outlet for those feelings. I do not know the end of this story, nor even how I want it to end.  God is the author.  But I know that the God who did not waste bread, fish or a dying thyroid would never waste my love.
     There is a Billy Joel song that expresses well the vulnerability that love entails.  The first verses express his unwillingness to open his heart and be hurt, but recognition of the mistake of passing love by.  The final verse of "And So It Goes" says:

     So I will choose to be with you
     as if the choice were mine to make.
     But you can make decisions too
     and you can have this heart to break.

     And so it goes, and so it goes
     And you're the only one who knows.

     Whenever you let someone into your heart, you are giving them access from which to break it, but that pain is preferable to the deadness of never letting it be broken.  That is why God has asked us to love so many so much.  He can heal a broken heart, those with numb hearts will never see the need.  The best consolation I have found when I have lost someone is knowing that I loved them as much as I could for as long as I could.  And so it goes, and so it goes and God's the only one who knows.



 

Lift Us Up Where We Belong

     I have noticed it is in fashion for young women to display visible bra straps. When I was in high school it was perfectly acceptable to wear no bra, but a mortal embarrassment to have a strap showing.  The braless look was especially popular among the young hippy girls but had the unfortunate, inevitable side effect of causing "the girls" to rest near the hips at a young age. Some of my U of M classmates had to bend over to fasten their belts. I have a friend who sells designer bra straps with lace, rhinestones etc. This is not a good idea for those of us who must wear industrial strength bras with their wide straps.  People might assume that in a middle aged muddle we had somehow tangled our belt over our shoulders.  I am not a pilot, but have lived among them long enough to know getting heavy objects off the ground requires a significant amount of lift, thrust and hardware.  There's a reason you don't see a lot of rhinestones in a hardware store.  Let's take that as a sign--a "Wide Load" sign.

Results Not Typical

     I'm sure there is a rule of grammar somewhere that says not to start an essay with the word because, however now that I started with the phrase above, that rule no longer applies since it will be in the second sentence.  Because we live in an age of litigation (brought on by an overabundance of lawyers, and the fact that the only elected officials capable of restraining them are also lawyers), we also live in an age of disclaimers like the title above. Disclaimers provide the legal loophole that protects a company from lawsuits if their product does not do what their advertising so brazenly proclaims it will. And as oxymoronic as it sounds, we also live in a age of gullible cynicism (or cynical gullibility if you prefer).  On one hand some people are cynical enough to believe that there is a vast conspiracy among thousands of independent physicians, many of whom became doctors so that no one could tell them what to do (and to get paid to tell other people what to do) to hide the benefits of certain health products, on the other hand those same people are gullible enough to buy products proven only by anecdotal evidence.
     The reason we believe that pills will burn away our fat, a special diet will prevent cancer or a topical cream will remove cellulite is because we want good health and looks--as long as it is easy.  To quote X-Files, we want to believe.  Advertisers know that given a choice between cheap and easy the public will choose easy.  Advertisers choose easy also; producing scientific evidence for the effectiveness of a product is hard, finding someone willing to appear on TV in before and after pictures is easy.  Slapping a "Results Not Typical" disclaimer somewhere on the ad is also easy.  Their toned, cancer and cellulite free butts are covered.
     Products which have been scientifically studied, even FDA approved, have even more disclaimers.  The prescription drug touting its health benefits on one page of a magazine is followed by two pages of warnings of possible side effects--like death.  Looking at the picture in the ad is easy, reading two pages of side effects is hard.  Learning the name of the drug to ask our doctor for is hard enough, we can't be expected to read the small print too.  Besides, if there is a problem, there are also plenty of ads from attorneys hunting for people who have been harmed by medications.  Working to earn and save money is hard, suing your way to wealth is easy.  Fortunately it is also easy to read this blog and reading it will make you smarter and better looking. 

Results Not Typical