She Was a Seller of Purple

Sometimes I hear a word or a phrase and it jumps onto the canvas of my mind and paints a picture. This phrase, this "seller of purple" captivated me.  What kind of woman gets that kind of description? Purple was the color of my notebook paper when I was 12,  I was enthralled that my best friend got to live in a house whose shutters were actually purple!  Had I been Dorothy, I'd have rather had purple slippers to wish me back home. It was the color of choice for times when I wanted to feel especially lovely. But, to garner a place in history as a seller off purple;  what did that mean?

Her name was Lydia and she was from a village in, what is now, Turkey,  known for it's dye works.  They produced the color purple in her region, which was extremely difficult to create and hard to come by.  Because of this, the dye was expensive and largely available only to the wealthy or persons of status.  Lydia decided to set up her own shop in a bustling river town, far from where she lived..  She was on her own, with her own business and known to the most important people in the area.  It was the year 50 A.D.  Lydia was an uncommon woman for her time.

Being a wealthy, well respected business woman would have left her with little need for anyone or anything.  She was woman, hear her roar.  With all that her position afforded her, though, Lydia was known for being a worshiper of God.  She would frequently gather with the other women in town to pray. One day two traveling evangelists came to her town and walked down to the prayer gathering to talk to the women.  Lydia was there.  She listened intently to what was being said and, that day, she and her entire household became the first christian converts on the continent of Europe.  Afterwards, she opened her home to become a center of hospitality for others seeking to believe.

This seller of purple lived a gutsy life. She left the familiar to seek out her future.  She believed at a time when, to do so, often incurred the wrath of the the people, some of them the very ones she did business with.  She extended the hand of friendship to other women and came alongside them without regard to her own status or theirs.  She took the first step, which required making the choice alone, and her courage bred courage in others.  She held her hand open to life and the Life Giver.

I want to be like this woman, this Lydia,  when I grow up.  I want to give away my cheap fear in exchange for expensive faith; faith that costs me more than I have.  I want to be found among the praying women and listening intently with my soul when truth is spoken.  I want to have the courage to step into the water before it parts, and look back to grab the hands of others.  When my race has been run and those lives I've touched have gathered to say goodbye, I want them to say, "Ah yes, she lived a life selling purple!"

The End of the RIde 2015

Such a year.  Such a rich, unexpected year.  I'm including some moments....some of my treasured ones.  Grateful beyond words for each one pictured.  I'm including some familiar words.  Ones that I read tonight and was tempted to skim over but something caught my heart and I read each one new; like I've never seen them before.  I speak them over you tonight as I think of each of you that comes to mind.  Speak them over the year we leave behind and the one we look full on.  The Almighty God bless you and keep you.

Our Father, Who art in heaven
Hallowed
be Thy name.
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth
as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For Thine
is the kingdom
and the power
and the glory
forever and ever
Amen

Silence of the Lamb

There are times when I call out to God; panic, angry, frustrated tearing kleenex kind of calling out and I don't hear anything back.

This.

"When Israel (you, me) was a child, then I loved him and called my son out of Egypt. Yet, I taught Ephraim (you, me) how to walk, taking them by their arms or taking them up in My arms, but they did not know that I healed them.  I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love, and I was to them as one who lifts up and eases the yoke over their cheeks,  and I bent down to them and gently laid food before them."  Hosea 11

Could it be, His "silence" is because He's holding me close?

Could it be I'm healed......and don't know it?

When I think of God, of the Lamb that He sent me, bending down to me, to me.....and gently laying food in front of me?

Could it be His silence is Him busy loving me.  And I didn't notice?

Raising Pink--On Being and Having a Daughter

It started out innocent enough.  I gave birth. My second child.  My first daughter.  We had our first talk that night in the hospital after visiting hours were over and everyone had gone home; just her and I celebrating her first birthday together.  She wore a form fitting blanket and a sock cap.  I had on a lovely hospital gown and booties.  We looked dashing, the two of us.  I whispered to her that I loved her; that I hoped someday, after all the business of growing up had been accomplished, we'd be friends.  She listened quietly as she slept in my lap.  I could tell she was thinking about what I'd said.

The truth was, I was afraid.  I'd had a son just 20 months ago.  But, sons.....they're another breed. They're more outside of yourself and you can watch and marvel and laugh at how different they are, all rough and tumble and making truck sounds.  A daughter, though, is rather like occupying the same space with your reflection.  You look into a mirror and her face is superimposed onto yours.  It causes a catch in your breath.

I was 30 when my life started to make a little more sense to me.  I had grown up, an only child, fearful and shy but with a hidden arsenal of zest and spunk that only a few got to see. I loved books and movies.  My favorite movie was The Wizard of Oz and I would go into my room and act out the part of Dorothy.  That "somewhere over the rainbow" idea....I could relate to that.  Something was out there and I wanted to find it!  But I carried with me a vague sense of having to apologize and not being quite sure for what.  I felt inexplicably guilty for creating dirty laundry  I cleaned up every crumb I dropped.  I felt strangely like an intruder.  And one day, when I was all grown up and had a blonde headed little boy in tow, I was asked the question when I'd have another.  I responded that I'd like to wait a bit longer.  "It must be nice to have a choice", came the hard reply.  That was my mother's voice.  I almost heard a click in my brain, as if a picture had been taken.  It felt like a slap at the time.  It seems like a light now. I had been an intruder, to her.  And it made all the difference in our dance as mother and daughter over the years.  You dance at a distance, all choppy and out of sync, when you haven't been asked to dance.

Through the years, I've learned more about my mother's life and some of the reasons for her choices and feelings.  It's a messy business and the dance never got any easier.  So, when my daughter and I were sharing her first birthday party that night in the hospital, this loomed heavy in the air.  And I whispered to her, but more to God, "May I have this dance, Rachael Diamond?".

And so....young mothers desiring to be good ones....

I read.  If I could get paid to read, I'm pretty sure I'd have more money than you.  I'm fascinated most by people's stories.  I don't have to agree with them.  I am just intrigued by the tapestry.

Currently, I'm reading Kisses From Katie by Katie Davis.  She is a 20 year old girl who walks away from her "normal American Tennessee life" to live in Uganda.  She ends up adopting several children during her first year and lives in a constant state of dependence on God.  Her biggest surprise is how much she could love these children, many of  whom she cannot even communicate with.  She learns, that is, what it is to be a mother.  And it got me to thinking.

I remember, with my first child, literally thinking...."today I parented perfectly."  That was my goal.  To be perfect.  I was terminally ill with that goal.  I did not lose my temper.  I kept him from acquiring any scratches or bruises.  I kept "bad people, bad influences" away from him.   I had a perfectly organized house.  I gave my child nutritious meals and clean clothes.  I bathed him.  I hugged and kissed him.  I read to him.  I just generally had it going on.  Of course, he was 3 months old.  But still.

24 years and six kids later, I look back and I wonder. In all those years of growing those little people, those "greenhouse" years, if you will,  one of my fears (there's that word again), one of my highest priorities, was that no one would taint them, that is, "mess up" my agenda for them.  I wanted, for them, joy and safety and as little disappointment as possible.  I wanted chocolate cookies to pass out to them after their naps in the afternoon.  I wanted Bible stories and church picnics.  I wanted healthy well baby checkups.  These were my children.  My children.  I would and did protect them at all costs.  I would die for them.

Back to Katie.  She is describing this life she chose for herself in Uganda.  The filth and poverty are overwhelming.  The needs are beyond what most of us even think of needing.  Not only does she adopt several children but she continually opens up her home to other villagers.  One day she becomes aware of children living in a home that is completely consumed with scabies.  She takes them to the doctor and is made aware of the process for healing them and decides to have them live with her during that process, since their biological family is unable to help them.  Scabies, folks, is incredibly contagious.  My own daughter from China had it when we first adopted her.  Left untreated can cause serious illness.   This young woman worried that bringing contagious children into her own home with her own children might not be the "responsible" thing to do. That is a reasonable thing for a loving mother to worry about.

But then....God.  He reminded her that He'd sent His own Son;  that "whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake..."  And so she took those scabies ridden children in and.....this is the point....she knew that, at the end of the day, the God who loved her children even more than she did would protect them.  He would either keep them free from illness OR....they would get scabies and God would see them through it.  Did you catch that?  I had to read it twice.  Either outcome.....was still God for them.

How many choices had I made in raising my own children that seemed like the loving, responsible thing to do....but lacked  the heart of the Protector of us all?

Psalm 62:7....."He is my strong protector.  He is my shelter."

Rolling Over in the Bank...and Other Adventures

I had a list to accomplish.  One of them was a stop at the bank.  I sat across from him discussing my options.  Banks intimidate me.  Mainly because I feel like I've just stumbled into the men's cigar lounge.  I mean, friends, I don't have any money to bank with.  Not bank, as in, things involving words like hedge and rollovers and strategies and stock options.  Is that even a banking term, that last one?  I'm about as lost in a bank world as I am in a car garage.  "Would you like to have your car rolled over, mam?"  I don't know.  Let's take it to the bank and hedge it in first.  I do things like make a deposit and feel especially snappy that my paycheck is direct deposit.  Look at me banking!

But, nevertheless, there I sat in the bank getting a 360 card and wondering what that stood for....like what about the other five days, was what I thought.  And all of a sudden I found myself asking him if a simple girl like me could actually do real banking with not very much because...and this is where my mouth got away from me...."as it turns out God is doing something in my life and I'm not sure exactly what it is but I think He wants to bless me and I want to be ready and responsible and a wise steward and I've always wanted to learn about these things anyway and is there someone here who could teach me how to start small as in really small and have you ever heard of Dave Ramsey?...."  It was here I took a breath.  His eyes lit up.  Yes, as a matter of fact, he and his wife have taken the Dave course.  And next thing you know he's asking me why I'm going to Denver and I tell him about Baby Bea and he tells me there's someone here who's boy goes to my school and well.....frankly, I left that bank feeling like Life had been left behind.  

I dropped by my school later to mix up bags of candy into a big, bright new orange bowl I got for the school store and take pictures and send them to instagram to let my students know I miss them and am thinking of them and looking forward to making small memories and caring about them.  There are some that I don't know well and ...when I see them in the hallway....my heart bursts  because I remember being where they are in life and I long to let them know I love them without even knowing them and I don't understand that except....except that God put that love there.

On the way out of the store, I lock the door and whisper His spirit to live there, to already begin working His peace ahead of time.  To work mighty in that little store, things we can't even ask or imagine...and not to stop with what I can imagine.  Break chains, soften hearts, bind up wounds, tie us together strong.  I pass two women I'd sat behind at church the day before coming into the school door and I nod and smile hello.  And then I stop.  And turn around.  They're gonna think I'm weird.  I do it anyway.  

"Excuse me.  I just wanted to tell you something.  Your worship yesterday?  In church?  It blessed me.  It made me brave to express what I felt too.  To lift up holy hands to Him.  Without regard to who thinks what.  Thank you for that."  They hugged me hard and thanked me for telling them and said they remembered me and what was my name and oh yes, you usually sat there and where have you been?  And so I told them honest that I was in a struggle for air and in danger of being a loner.  We will start watching for you and seeking you out, they told me.  And I knew it was His arm, pulling me close to safety.  

So these encounters?  These insignificant moments where I talk lots of words all together and take a chance that they won't be received?  Or that I'll walk away feeling alone or dumb?  End up being the times when every day stuff feels like seeds planted in my soul.  Like He really is everywhere around me waiting to be invited in.  It waters me.  I sprout new shoots and hope revives again.  

And I cannot wait to find out about banks.

Vinegar in the Shower

I've reached that point in life where I never thought I'd be.....as old as I am.

This morning I woke up early....for no other reason than I was excited to clean my bathroom. My son recently took time on his day off to come and paint my bathroom ceiling, .which could only be described as prison shower gross....not that I've seen one.  I'm just saying.  That clean white slate of a ceiling inspired me to think..."Wonder if the rest of the bathroom could look that good?".  And thus, my plan was hatched and my Saturday morning agenda was set.  I researched "how to get soap scum off the shower door" on the internet and climbed into the shower with nothing but a bowl of white vinegar, a sponge and the suit I was wearing on my first birthday.  And I sang as I worked.

Last night, I drove into the Wal-Mart parking lot with my 13 year old daughter to get lavender scented bleach.  At the entrance, we saw a fundraiser group serving up hamburgers and hot dogs and bought ourselves a "combo".  We took them and sat on a bench together and ate that health food with gusto.  We smelled candles until we staggered from the scents and bought a People magazine to do the crossword puzzle.   It was a Friday night.  And I enjoyed it.  And it was good.

This age thing is a chameleon that slips up on you.   Things shift.  Your eyesight starts to change, and yet you see some things clearer.  You have less answers but a larger perspective.  You don't necessarily seek out excitement but you still have dreams and ideas that excite you.  You take joy in the simple things but aren't simple minded.  Your feet hurt more at the end of the day but you savor the steps you took.  You look back more often, just for a glimpse of what was, and in the process you sometimes see things you'd have done differently if you'd had a clue.

I recently described to my older daughter the feeling I had as I metamorphisized; I know it's not a word, but it's my blog and I like it; of silently, almost imperceptibly having stepped across an invisible chasm at some point.  I turn around to those younger than I and I want to reach out and grab them by their youthful jowls and say..."Hey!  Pay attention!  Live life!  Live it well!  Gusto it up!  Learn to laugh at yourself; to forgive yourself so you can forgive others; to not stand as long in front of a mirror, unless you're drawing pictures in the steam,  but rather look into the face of your Father, to read more, sing stupid songs all loud and obnoxious, do something for someone shy and quiet who feels invisible, loose the "cool" meter......it changes faster than you'll be able to keep up with anyway.

And most of all, don't discount those older than you who you mistakenly assume you are smarter than or hipper than or are tempted to think obsolete just for being around longer.  We may be standing naked in the shower with a bowl full of vinegar and a sponge but we got something to say!

Been that, Done there

My girl says she wants me to write a handbook on tricks of the trade in raising kids.  She's a brand new 15, right between "You know everything" and "No....wait....I know everything", depending on the day, hormone levels and how much sleep she's had.  She is the last of my six pack of kids and challenges me more than all the rest combined.  I think it's because I'm tireder.  It can't be because she's smarter.  Can it?  Nevertheless, she has not yet raised six people to young adulthood and lived to tell about it.  So, I win.

I dipped my toe into the pool of motherhood at the age of 30, a late start which I more than made up for by having three more children by the time I reached 36.  To complete the tapestry, I have a son and a daughter adopted from Korea and China respectively.  As an only child myself, this was like creating my own party-in-a-box; the kind where the motto is "Whatever You Say Can, and Will, Be Repeated in Sunday School!"  That's my first tip.  Whatever personal puffed up pride you had when you bought this parenthood t shirt, loose it now before the little natives take it from your balled up fists.  Learn to relax in the knowledge that you don't have to be perfect to love them well.

Let me remind you that any answers you thought you had in your smug pre-kid days were settled on before you entered the land.  You had no idea what you were talking about, no matter how many times you read the brochures!  You realize that fairly early on.  For instance,  one of my "rules", made while I was pregnant with my first, was that I would not have Legos in my home.  I refused to have them left scattered everywhere, where I would step on them in the middle of the night.  The middle of the night, you say?  Yes.  Because that's when you will be awake for the next several years.....stepping on Legos.  I think I can still see the faint imprint of a Lego man face on the bottom of my aging foot.  Learn to laugh, rather than cringe, when things don't look like you pictured.

I worked in a clothing store in my young life and actually used to write on the calendar what I wore each day just to see how many days I could go and not wear the same outfit twice.  Seriously?  That was my goal?   After my third child was born,  I joined a wonderful group called MOPS, Mothers of Pre Schoolers.  They met once a month.  You could drop your kids off in one room for fun activities and go to the mom's room for ladylike snacks and interesting speakers, etc.  One particular winter morning,  I was running late, having had the added task of bundling up the troops for the weather.  We got to the meeting just as it began and I hurriedly dropped the kids off in their room.  As I walked into the mom's room, the speaker already having begun, I headed toward an empty seat, unbuttoning my coat as I went.  Just before I took my coat off, I looked down to discover I STILL HAD MY PAJAMAS ON.  Two things there to take away from this; coats cover a multitude of "sins", from pajamas to spit up and, you won't be needing a calendar to keep track of your outfits anymore because you will be thankful to have anything on other than your pajamas.  Learn to not take yourself so seriously and how to accessorize your pj's.

I enjoyed letting the kids participate in helping me cook as much as was age appropriate.  I baked a lot and kept a huge tub of flour in the kitchen.  One morning we were baking pies and I was letting my two oldest measure out the ingredients and using the opportunity to talk about the difference in the sizes of cup, half cup, etc.  I was so proud of my homeschool moment and decided to go get the camera in the next room to document our progress.  I walked back into the kitchen only to find my kids standing in the tub of flour and pouring it on each others' heads.  At the sight of me, they both stopped in mid action and blinked through flour covered eyelashes like two little snowmen looking into the barrel of a lighter.  No one moved.  No one spoke.  Until.....I burst out laughing and snapped a picture.  After the container of flour was thrown out, the pies made and the kids put in the bathtub, I realized a memory had been made that day and it would find it's way into the stories they told their own kids. Learn to watch for those memory making moments, sometimes disguised as interruptions and wasted flour.

My fifth child, Solomon, came along, adopted from Korea and already" pre-grown" for me to the ripe old age of 14 months when we got him.  I was used to spinning several plates at a time by this point, and was beginning to feel like mama superior.  One day I was talking on the phone, distracted from what was going on around me.  Assuming the kids were playing outside in the sandbox,  I turned and almost tripped over Solomon, who was lying in a prone position, gnawing at a hardened cheerio he'd found hardened onto the floor like a fossil.  "For  this we adopted you, son?!", I thought to myself.  I sighed, and kneeled to pick him up and find him something proper to eat.  He toddled happily off and I laughed at myself.  Learn to do that;  to laugh the loudest and the longest at yourself.  To give yourself a break.

If I could do it all over again, I would.  Every chicken pock I put baking soda on, every juice glass I poured and then mopped up off the floor, every sentence I read several times over in any book I tried to read when the kids were awake, every failure I felt when I laid in my bed at the end of the day and looked up at the ceiling and talked to God.  This is what I know.  Whenever you feel like you aren't doing it right.....or enough.....or too much......know that you love your kid.  Know that from the bottom of your lego imprinted feet to the top of your messed up hair that you don't have time to fix just so.  And laugh, and take pictures and savor it like it's the last piece of chocolate in the box.  Because someday you can finish that book you never got to read, and your pajamas will be waiting for you in the drawer after you get home.  Your floors won't be covered in flour.  Your hair will look good most of the time.  And you will know that you did the best you could.  And you can smile at the days behind you.

He Does Make Beautiful Things

I thought to write about the day after Christmas and how I'm glad that it's over.  Because as fine as I am being alone, I'm not and it still makes me emotionally uncomfortable and I squirm to be out from under the Christmas thumb.  I love the idea of Christmas.  I just don't love the reality of it sometimes.  I struggle to keep my bones from hurting.  To acknowledge the truth of what I am really celebrating, rather than what the culture gives me.  It seeps under my skin and starts to poison me quick if I'm not vigilant to guard the door of my heart.  "It's too bad about your life," Lie smirks.  I look around and all is not Polar Express perfect and the hot chocolate isn't served by dancing waiters.  In fact, I was out of milk so there was no hot chocolate at all.  I blogged bravely that I was ok.  But I cried some.  So.  Yeah.  I'm glad Christmas is over.  It exhausted me, the fight I felt myself in.

I love life.  Like the real kind on any given Thursday in April that doesn't have something attached to it that makes me feel like a left out loser.  It doesn't take as much for me to dig in and keep to it.  It can be raining and I'm still ok.  In fact, I would garden in the rain and have fun, all sloppy muddy non perfect.  It's not perfect I require.  It's not problem free I desire.  It's the grimy underbelly that I find hidden under the rocks and brush off to see what He had in mind in others, in turning a situation around in the ugly beautiful.  That's where the sun starts shining for me. 

To watch how He makes beautiful things out of what isn't already tinsel; what's frayed on the ends or muddy where it got dragged through dirt.  I love seeing a smile on a face that got there, not because they got what they wanted for Christmas, but because you see each other and are happy about it.  That.  That doesn't wear me out.  It cost nothing.  Except heart risk and time.  Those are His tools though.  

My favorite "carol" isn't Silent Night.  Because on any given Thursday in April, you might hear me singing "He Makes Beautiful Things" as reverently as any Christmas song......because I made a difference in someone's life and they made a difference in mine.

Merry Any Given Thursday....:)

Christmas on Alpha Centauri

Katz:  You think there's anyone else on Earth lookin up at the sky and seein as many stars as we are?
            I gotta be lookin at a million of em.

Bill:  The naked eye can see 2,000

Katz:  Well then I really got great eyes cause I'm lookin at a million.

Bill:  Alpha Centauri is the closest. That's 4 1/2 light years away.  Each light year is 6 trillion miles.
          So that's 26 trillion miles.

Katz:  That's the closest?

Bill:  Yep.  And there's 100 million stars in our galaxy; more galaxies in the universe than grains of
          sand on Earth.

Katz:  That is big.

Bill:  Yeah.  And we are small.
                                                                       --A Walk in the Woods, Bill Bryson


"You alone are the Lord.  You have made the heavens; the heavens of heavens with all their host; the earth and all that is on it; the seas and all that is in them.  You give life to all of them and the heavenly host bows down before You.--Nehemiah 9:6

Violent Falling.......Tender Rescuing

That's what I love.  I learned something, so dear my heart literally grabbed hold of it hungry and keeps going back to eat more.  I learned that this verse in Micah 7....."though I have fallen, I will rise."  That word?  Fallen?  It means "a violent or accidental circumstance or event."  It jolted truth like lightning through me as I read it again and again....."hope" whispered echoey in my mind over and over.

This year I fell accidental and it felt violent.  I know it accidental because my heart has never been more pure, more listening to Him.  I cared more deeply for another than for myself and I felt cuts on my skin when I wrapped my arms around him, literally and figuratively. I knew my heart was vulnerable. His wounds wounded me.  But He said "abide, stay."  So I did.  And then day, one awful moment I took my eyes off of Him, I shut my ears to His whisper.  And I sinned.  I fell.  Violent and accidental.  I never meant to hurt.  I never meant to hurt.  I never meant to........and I ran out of breath and words.

The shadow of this picture represents for me, words I can't roll back, a mistake I can't make right.  It keeps me humbled under His hand.  And He has covered me there with His words.  "Because they had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the counsel of the Most High, therefore He bowed down their hearts......then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He saved them out of their darkness." Ps 107  I have fully felt the brunt of my error and I grieve for it still.  But God.......

Since that time, He has reached in and pulled out muck that I did not want to look at full on; muck that I threw at a tender soul.  He has shown me what I asked Him for; "Please God.....keep me in a place that I know when I begin to stray from You...."   He used my girl to show me.  She was there that day.  "What you said was true.  How you said it would have made me pull back.  I knew you loved him.  I think he forgot that right then."  My heart felt it immediately and I winced as He picked me up and held me close.  "I'm sorry, I'm sorry.  I'm so sorry, Father."  Please bind up what I can't.  My Defender, My Provider, My Savior has sewn me back together slowly but there is a sore and red place that I pray will stay tender.  It causes me to turn my eyes to Him.

I shake a little still when I look at this shadow today. I remember the day I took this.  "Tamara!" he yelled around the corner.  How I loved to hear him call my name excited.  "Come take a picture of this!" I love who it belongs to.  But I tell it to the One Who loves him perfect.  And walk in the grace and promise He's given me.......that he is not out of His sight, He's the Maker of the shadows of boys wounded and the Righter of all wrongs.  

A Most Silent of Nights

Silent Night is my favorite.  Since I was a girl.  It makes me fill up peaceful and quiet.  I love it so.  I cry every time I try to sing it.  The notes just right to make me feel weepy.

This version is less typical.  I love the feet out of the window in the breeze, the train going by....I so love trains. It's done by one of my favorite artists.  Josh Garrels is slightly different in his approach.  He's that blend of artistic, expresses himself just a little outside the box enough person that I find intriguing.. It grabs my feeling of being different by the hand and makes me feel at home.  Even the name of his record company, Mason Jar Music......I just like it is all.  

Christmas eve, for me, has always meant candles and warmth and quiet celebration.  I am not the party person.  Never have been.  And with six kids, that was my style of party anyway.  I loved creating traditions and reading out loud to them as they sat spellbound, Rachael's eyes turned red and watery from forgetting to blink, she was so entranced by what came next.  I let them pick four movies....four, think of it!.....and they made beds all over their big brother's bedroom floor and had a "kids' party" all their own late into the night.

I find myself smiling as I type.  I can still hear them, see them, feel the anticipation they did because I guess I've never really grown out of that little girl.  Tomorrow night, as things go, I will be spending Christmas Eve alone, the kids at their father's until late.  I've had offers from friends but there's something about the holiday at someone else's house and someone else's family.  You can end up feeling like an extra puzzle piece.  It's not how I thought this Christmas would go. It's not that I wish it couldn't be different.  But I'm ok with it.  I guess the only child in me can wear solitude easier than some.  I will get on what's left of my rainbow house slippers, the soles worn almost clear through now, from wearing them outside when I shouldn't.  

I will light my favorite pine scented candle and read the Christmas story like I have every year since I was in high school; just me and my Bible.  I will eat nutella and watch Downton Abbey from the beginning and curl up under my fluffiest comforter and talk to the Comforter Himself.  Because I have learned, truly learned, to be content in whatever the circumstances.  As it turns out, the circumstances are exactly where He is.  And that is where I want to be.  

Stollen Moments

It's not really Stollen....in the truest sense of the word,  but I liked the play on words so Stollen is what you get.  It's a coffee cake.....a cream cheese coffee cake I found in one of those slick Christian women's magazines that I used to read to try and figure out how to be one.  I had just had my first child, my Caleb, and he was three months old and Christmas had suddenly taken a turn for the magical.  I began a tradition that year of making my own Christmas cards; one I handed over to the kids as soon as they could create something with a crayon.  That year I bought an ink pad green and stamped Caleb's foot over 50 times onto the blank white card stock.  I glued a tiny red ribbon onto the big toe...."This Christmas, be thankful for the little things", I quipped proud.  Martha Stewart would have awarded me Something of the Year.

This particular afternoon, as Caleb lay sleeping tight on my lap, I found the recipe.  And that day, unbeknownst to me then, a legacy was formed.  I have made that coffee cake every year since, during the holidays.  At first the consistency of cream cheese was more than my little ones could handle but as their taste buds grew common sense, I had to make two just to satisfy the natives.  My kids will tell you one of their fondest memories is waking up on Christmas morning to the sound of me busy in the kitchen making exactly what they had come to expect.  And, as legacy works, I have made that coffee cake since for others I have loved, as have my older girls, calling from far away for the magic recipe.

This year, though, this year is different.  It's just Naomi and I at home on Christmas morning.  Three of my six are miles away, one nurturing her new little one, one preparing to move back to home ground nearby next month and one having made his trek at Thanksgiving time.  My Caleb, now 27 and preparing for his two year adventure in Africa, has invited us to his place for brunch this year.  As a mama, it's a good and wise thing to let the reigns fall out of your hands with grace.  I seize the warmth of having my boy take his turn.

So, this Christmas morning, I will share brunch, prepared for us by my boy who makes me proud,  with my three kids yet still here.  And I will bring cream cheese coffee cake.  Because it is a stolen moment for my hearts' memory.

Loneliness

It's a funny thing, that emotion.  It feels sinister and makes me panic and I grab blankets or chocolate or search the room wildly for busywork.  Like someone's got a gun to my head.  I. have. got. to. get. this. done. I say through focused scary brain because I'm afraid to look up from what I'm doing.  I'm afraid something might grab me that I don't see.

Loneliness moves into my space when I feel like I've lost something. It sits in my favorite chair and mocks me.  I can be surrounded by friends at church, the kind that mean what they say, and still I feel alone.  Lonely is a liar. It robs me of what's real and tries to get me to believe that what I've lost is all I had.

It also shames me.  How strange it is that I'd rather admit a character flaw than the emotion of lonely.  There's a certain sense of compulsion to convince that life is a commercial and who me?  Lonely?  Don't be ridiculous.  I am blessed.  Blessed, I tell you.  Call me blessed.  I don't have time to be lonely.  See my smiling pictures of Facebook with all the people who love me??  That's why I put them there.

But the truth is.......lonely doesn't look at my watch or my calendar.  It doesn't care what you think of me.  It rushes in unawares when it sees me vulnerable.  And threatens to take me down; to build a plexiglass wall around me that I can't reach past and no one else can see but me.  And I start to feel mute and listless.  And even my arms feel weak so I can't wave a white flag.

I just wanted to let you know.  Sometimes I feel lonely.

When You Get That Early Morning Text....

"Do you ever feel like a complete failure?"  And you go to answer it and instead you "accidentally" call them.  And you say, "what's going on?" and you really mean....what just happened with the phone?......but you hear the person's voice on the other end and then you realize.......

Oh.  "What's going on?" means something entirely different.

And they tell you.  The details.  The argument.  The feelings of failure.

And you hear yourself asking..."What are you afraid of?"  Like, underneath it all?  And the answer is the surface reason.  "No," you hear yourself saying.  "What are you afraid of most?"

"Being alone.  Feeling like I don't have anyone.  No friends. Nothing."

That's what you're really "arguing" about.  That's where the enemy has you.  It's fear.  And fear tells lies.  And wreaks havoc.

And you realize, probably more than the person you are talking to, that you are not the "wise" one.  You are not the answer at all.  You realize that God Himself just spoke out of your own mouth.....to the both of you.

That's how He uses us in each other's lives.

What are you afraid of?

Sleep Interrupted.....Girl on Fire

I lay here in the middle of my night and I have this sense of urgency; of heightened perspective.

It's already a new day.  It'll soon be a new year.

This thought keeps coming to mind.

Nothing matters but the eternal 

I want to grab onto you, grab onto myself and say it in the mirror.....

Nothing matters but the eternal

This new year?  This new day?  Hold onto each other brave and tight and be our reminder, our encourager, our lighthouse, our compass.....yell it if you have to, like you would if you see danger ahead and you're not worried about hurt feelings at that moment because you just want them to be safe.

The distractions of the day, the needful, the creative, the sandpaper of living with each other, the abundance of money to play with, the lack of money to live with, My leg hurts, my heart hurts, where to vacation this year.  Life ends for someone, begins for another.  You've got it figured out...then...what in the world is going on?  Should we have sushi or mexican?  What will become of my kid one day, why can't I just get them to take out the trash?  Just take out the flippin trash!  And just what did you mean by that??  I'm nervous.  I'm peaceful.  Why can't I just let it go?!  Check out that chick, if I could only be married to her. I'm lonely.  Leave me alone.  Come back.  Look what I painted, look what I wrote, look what I photographed, look what I cooked....look at me, notice me, love me, do I matter, what matters, what even matters??!

God does.  Forever does.  Yeah.  But the distractions.  They pull at my head and my heart and my hands and my mind.  And before you know it I'm elbow deep in bread dough and netflix choices and financial advisors and chestnuts roasting by an open fire pursuits and arguments and hurt feelings and  relationships that exploded and when did my rudder turn??

God?  Make even my "good" things mean nothing if the eternal isn't in it.  Make my every endeavor pale, make it turn to dust, frustrate me, don't let me run away, don't let me stop too soon.  Don't let my conversations be less than honesty,  stop me, stop me, stop me.....if it takes the place of the eternal.

Don't give me what I want.  Give me all of You.

Don't Tame Me

"Sameness is tameness"  D.B. Estep

I heard that today and it ricocheted around in my brain as I sat there quiet in a bible class.  I have moments like that frequently.  Like a shot in the sky that makes me stop and I can't move past what it does inside of me. I look around the room to see if anyone else is looking wide eyed bulls eyed hit.   I grabbed onto it.  That.  That's what I want.  I want to be shaken up.  I'm scared at the thought of being left the same.  I'm terrified of change that I didn't authorize.  And here lately, there's been a lot of that.  But those are the terms.  To avoid "tame", I have to board a train I'm not driving.  I have to let "same" slip out of my grasp.  

The adventure of living a life in His hands is one I don't get to define.  I think of the tempest of tame avoidance and I picture white water rafting and hikes up the sides of steep, windy mountains and the swell of the "Rocky" theme as I stand triumphant.  And there are those over the moon moments. January 1, 2016 at 6 a.m. I will board a plane to Denver, where Beatrice Haven and I will begin our relationship as Nana and granddaughter.  That's not anything new under the sun for anyone else but me.  But in my journey?  It marks legacy and a deeper purpose than even my own motherhood.  This is catching a glimpse of seeing what I planted and raising me one better.  I'm all kinds of emotions I don't have names for over that.

There's today.  I had one friend new, who sat right down in front of me and wondered where I'd been the last three weeks and waited for an answer.  Not to be nosey or polite.  To care enough to ask and to look me right in the eye while I answered honest. There's the the one who put their hand on my shoulder while we prayed and looked at me after. "I'm glad you're here." There's my other friend who saw me walk into the church auditorium and called out, "There you are!" and grabbed hold and hugged me hard.  There's another who waved at me smiling.  My "adopted" mom and dad, who took us to Sunday dinner and showered us with love and laughter and bags full of gifts we don't deserve.  My favorite one was the small container of nutella tucked into a corner of the bag because that said "I know you."  To be known is my oxygen.  To want to be known is life to me.  

Those things?  Tether me to the anchor of Him for the wild ride of "tame shedding".  He is in each of the anchor people He puts in my life to help me walk right out into the dark. But some of those anchors challenge me and rock me in ways I don't like.  They say things; do things that make my skin burn and my teeth hurt and my nerves jangle.  They walk out on me, hold a mirror to my face, leave me sucking in air or sputtering under hurt. They tell me things I don't want to hear.  They make me feel things I don't want to feel. They bump up against my shins and make me shift my feet quick to avoid the pain; escape the challenge.   Because that is my first inclination. But right before I run to the bow of the boat,  it makes me look facing out at the water and forces the question.  Do you want to go sit hidden and try to tame the waves?  

Do you really want everything to stay the same?  

Ontologically speaking....

I'd woken up at 3 am., something that keeps happening as of late.  I used to fret.  Now I just pray and ponder.  Or write.  :)

I grabbed my phone and saw 23 notifications from Facebook.  I decided I'd catch up on that office work.  Then, I posted.  A random, worthless post about being awake.  But then I got to thinking what God had in His word about night and found a verse that described what He'd been teaching me to do when I'm awake and the world isn't.  So I went back and edited that in.  And as I began to ponder I decided...."You're stupid.  Go back and get that post off Facebook.  No one cares.  It's useless. They're sleeping.  And when they're awake, they still won't care.  Just shut up."  It goes without saying, sometimes my pondering can be brutal.

I found the blinking light of my phone in the dark and hit the Facebook icon to eliminate my stupidity before anyone else noticed.  But someone had noticed.  There was a telltale red comment notification.  I cringed.  I was too late.  And then I read this.  "Please pray for me.  I'm having a difficult night."  I let her know that I would and put my phone down and got up to walk.  I do that sometimes?  When I pray?  It seems to help me process.  I walk around my kitchen and out into my "wooden room" and back again.  It's ok.  He goes with me.

 God?  This prayer thing.  You've had me in this school this year.  But I have questions.  Does it matter?  You already know she's having a difficult night.  Why would You want me to tell You what You already see?  It's not that I doubt that You hear me.  It's not that I question that You want me to pray.  It's just that it's a mystery to me.  My friend gave me a bracelet for Christmas made from mud that says "pray" on it.  I like that it isn't capitalized.  Capitalizing makes it seem formal and distant to me.  I want it to be common and muddy messy.  I've got it on my wrist inked with the tamarisk tree....this praying thing will be my legacy.  I just don't have it all figured out.  Don't need to.  But I like that I know I can ask Him, tell Him, ponder with Him.  He loves me even when I ask too many questions.  Sometimes He gives me answers.  Sometimes I just feel Him smile at me.

I find a book on my shelf  about prayer that I never finished and decide to start it over.  It looks and sounds all scholarly and I take small bites because it's good but it's the dark chocolate of books.  A little at a time.  I open it randomly.  "Ontologically, Jesus relationship with the Father is, of course unique, but experientially we are invited into the same intimacy with Father God that He knew while here in the flesh."  I click a new tab on my computer and look up that word. "The process of being and their relations."  I laugh at me and my word junkie self but I feel all smart learning something new.

I click back briefly to Facebook and see that Bobby Brady from the Brady Bunch is turning 55.  Sometimes?  Facebook and it's information makes me tired and I feel robbed of something I can't quite put my finger on.  Ontologically speaking, I have a complicated relationship with it.  But in the wee hours of this and other days, on any given afternoon and sometimes in the evening before signing off and returning to the world in front of me, I smile at your adventures, I share mine with you, I give you words for little presents from me.  And sometimes I hear whispered prayer requests.  And I know that some of this really matters.

But seriously.  Bobby Brady is 55??

"It's Snowing!"

I've just now finished watching a movie I've come to put on my Christmas list each year.  It's a family during the holidays, all grown children come home to celebrate and the dynamics of bringing new people to the mix and how that plays itself out; all misunderstandings and the brittle awkwardness of trying to fit in and get used to one another, to something that's different from what it's always been.  There's pain and humor.  Just like life.  The thing that was going to be kept hidden until after Christmas, though, slips out during a confrontation.  The mom is dying.  She wanted it not to color the holiday, the last one she suspected she was going to have.

The thing is, the tremble that went through everyone when it was spoken out loud, shifted Christmas day hard.  It brought a sharp focus.  It forced the moment to be noticed differently.  It cost more all of a sudden.  The brittle new was still there; to some almost resented like an intruder.  How dare you get to be be here while I hear this news.  What do you know about it?  What if it's all your fault, this new you bring, like somehow it made the old start dying right then?  It's irrational.  But it's real.  

Christmas evening, the family is in the background while the mom is staring out the window in the kitchen.  One of the family sees her and comes alongside.  There's always one, isn't there?  One that notices what others don't.  You expect her to cry or to say something about dying.  She blinks and smiles....."It's snowing!" she says, like a little girl happy.  You pay more attention when you think it's your last.  I like that she says that.  

The scene fades and it's a snowy morning, Christmas a year later.  The babies are now toddlers, the "new" people from last year are now an easy part of the mix.  It's time to turn the lights on on the tree, just like always and everyone gathers round.  "It's a good tree, dad," says one of the daughters and they all nod wordlessly.  "Are you okay?" asks her boyfriend?  She looks at him with tears in her eyes and nods yes.  The camera pans to a framed picture of her mother on a table nearby, the lights from the tree reflecting on it to let you know she's gone now.  In the reflection, you can see the family begin to trim the tree and remember the ornaments together, smiling and laughing.  There's a tender joy there.  The kind that living and loving and losing bring.

The picture of the mother, taken when she was young and pregnant with one of her kids, always makes me think of my Noah.  He was 18 months old when I almost died.  I think now that he would have no memory of me and thank God for the chance to raise him.  He would have been alright.  I am just so grateful for the grace.   But this time, as the movie ended, I thought back on this year  and all that God has taught me about life and loss and sorting that out; about noticing when somebody falters under the weight of it.  Thanksgiving Day this year was spent in the company of a young one that has experienced loss I can only begin to touch.  As the credits rolled it suddenly occurred to me; I had been the "new" in his holiday that day and I had forgotten to ask him if he was okay; to tell him that I remembered.  to acknowledge what he must have been struggling with.  I regret that.

I wanted to be the one who came up beside him at the window.  And I forgot to pay attention.  I pray I won't do that again.

The End of the Semester......

The end.  Of the first school semester of my girls' career and I look at her and marvel.  She walks tall and graceful through the halls.  She has gathered, for herself, a group of friends that want to be her friend as much as she wants to be theirs.  It is her community and I warm happy in my heart when I step into the school cafeteria and see her smile big as her face.  She enjoys her homework so much I miss her company but smile at her as she checks her grades each night online.  She has flowered and been watered in her spirit and I thank Him breathless sometimes.  "I can't imagine not going to school now, Mama."  Me either, girlie.

My girl in the west waits eager for her man to get there.  Their first Christmas together as a couple.  He has made her happy and I am so grateful for what they have.  They are best friends who talk and share their ideas and silly secrets freely.  He has made her feel safe and chosen.  He is who I prayed for for her when she lay her silky blonde little head on her pillow each night as a tiny girl.  I'm grateful to tears and hang up the phone from talking to her secure in knowing her heart is cared for.

My grandbaby is safely born and snuggled up in her parents' arms.....two people in whom I am confidently blessed to see follow Him in how they live and love.  They will make dynamite parents.  I am honored to be able to say they are my "kids".  They create and take lovely pictures and have made their own way through a fabulously challenging first year of marriage, shaking strong and resolute in Who has carried them.  I love them so.

I sit in my big green chair this first afternoon of Christmas break, my thinking spot inside my house and remember how I felt the first day of work at school, my cheeks blushed hot from happy joy and nervous energy.  Would they like me?  Would I find my place, my path, His path for me?  As it turns out, the answer is yes!  Yes!  Happy, giddy yes!  I've felt some pain, to be sure.  Some worry.  Some confusion.  But never doubt that I was put there by His hand.  And with each dagger that I put at His feet, daggers that threatened to stop my breathing, stop my spirit from Life......He has peeled back my protective skin that rushes to keep me bound in my own brand of safety and left me with tender new skin that hurts when it's cut.  And I have looked upward to Him with question marks running down mixed with the blood from living real.  THIS HURTS.  THIS SCARES ME.  HOW WILL YOU FIX THIS?  I scream the questions quiet in my brain as I pace the gym floor each morning.  "Abide."  The quiet word repeats itself until I fall down exhausted.  And surrendered.

This year; this impossible year that I named in January has surprised me with its unexpected journey.  And, as I type I sense that I am taking the impossible with me into the new year.  And I will name it "Sequel".  Because there's pictures half painted that I'm eager to see His brush pass over.

It's Christmastime......

It'll be different this year for Naomi and I.  Very different.  No daughters, save my girlie, will be here.  My Montana boy has already made the trek his budget will allow for this holiday time.  My two boys, one so close to leaving for the next year I can feel him starting to slip away already, his plans busily being made. will come by for awhile.  But, as motherhood goes, you work yourself out of a job and things change and there are friends and rounds to be made that year.  Time changes things.  And I'm okay with that.  I am.  I've learned to not place so much importance on one day; because it turns out each day is valuable time spent when you can find it.  I've grown to let go of expectations.  They tend to make me fretful and discontent.

I have Bea to think about now and this time next year, they will be closer and I can spill out Nana love in delicious children's books and cuddle time.  I can hardly get my brain around how that will feel.  My other girl gone west will also be home then.  She is moving back; she's lived the year she said she would and grown so strong in her faith it takes my breath away.  She comes back different, stronger, and in love.

So, my mama heart looks forward to the future; my deepest longing to nurture and bake and find quiet ways to love given a second round.  For this year, though, it will be quiet and I will spend Christmas Eve with havarti cheese and crackers and Polar Express.  Because every other day of the year, I've invested and been invested in.  And I can rest easy that I am loved.  And all is well.

Merry Christmas, friends....I love you all year long!

Untitled......

My granddaughter is letting everyone know she's going to arrive soon.  It could be tonight.  It might be tomorrow.  So we wait.  And I wait far away, several states away.  I have the heart, just not the money to go.  And I was fine with that.  I've learned, the years of being divorced and on my own being my teacher, that His grace is truly enough and when I don't have enough, I still do.  I know that sounds pious and terribly spiritual.  But to look around at what He's done for me, as I sit in a house that's way too big for me and have to think ahead of time which outfit to wear to work the next day because I have a closet full of them?  You see, when I kicked myself out of my marriage?  I expected to be kicked out of God's favor.  I deserved to live in a gutter.  That's what I believed.  Falling and failing caused me to feel His arms around me for the first time in my life.

So yeah.  I risk sounding like the church lady because this is one truth I have lived.  He is my rescuer.  He is also my provider.  He is my idea of a perfect man, if ever there was one.  He loves to surprise me, to show up just when I'd given up and dazzle me.  Today he whispered in the ear of someone who didn't fully understand what she was hearing.  "Give the money you were given to Tamara.  She needs it to go see her granddaughter."  The amazing part of this?  She had no idea I wasn't going to go, because she had no idea I could not afford it.  So, my Man, my heavenly Dad.......tapped a friend on the shoulder I haven't seen or spoken to in ages and used her willing heart to bless me.  He did that for me.  For me.  Can you imagine how pleased He is that one of His children listened to intently to bless another so quickly.  It makes me smile happy.

The past two weeks, I've stepped into the gym and looked up hungry for comfort. I've felt like such a failure.  I've cried lonely for hearts I broke and lost company that I treasured.  I slapped myself over and over for never getting it right.  For feeling like I would never grow up and be what He wanted me to be.  For not being able to love well.  I've seen faces once turned to me eager, now look the other way cold and I felt like I was going to throw up.  Father?  I broke what You gave me.  I'm scared I used up Your grace this time.  What if He won't help me make it right?  What if He somehow attaches school fees as an addendum to punishment like a heavenly congressman and I can't pay for those either?  What if my daughter can't finish out the school year?  What if all of this is my fault?

But....God.  Be still.  And know.  That I.  Am God.  

This morning as I walked the gym and sung "I'm no longer a slave to fear....I am a child of God." I sensed a presence.  His presence.  "I'm doing things You don't see.  Be still.  I will show you Who I am."  

I'll whisper all of this to Baby Beatrice when I see her.  And I look to the horizon for more of what He has.

Saying What You're Not

Many times I hear this.  "You're so brave and honest to say what you do.  It changes my walk and my perspective.  It makes me feel brave."  It's true I speak plain.  I am an open book, most of the time.  I can pull in fearful when someone intimidates me and self edit out of terror of their reaction.  I don't like it when people are angry with me or don't like me.  It makes me feel small and wrong.  And I scramble in unhealthy ways to make it go away.  But the truth is, what I feel doesn't define my character.  It's just sometimes hard to ignore.

But my words have become my "calling".  I tell quick whoever lays admiration at me feet, "Before you consider this a virtue, consider that I find myself told to do this by my Creator."  I fuel myself through writing and "work out my salvation" by sewing thoughts together.  It is true I enjoy that part.  The other?  The transparency?  The publishing of my guts?  I do it because it seems I'm "supposed to".

When I start to doubt I'm making sense,, doubt I'm doing any good, doubt I'm coming across as anything other than a needy fool.....just doubt?  He sends me you and your words show me what He is intending.  This that I do pulls people into my journey, pulls people to consider Him.  I find myself surrounded by a cloud of witnesses right here on earth.  He cloaks me with you and we form a community who gathers up close and opens our hearts to each other.

He's making us all brave, even if it's just to whisper, "I feel that too sometimes."  He's calling us to press on.  This life is hard.  It's harder still to feel afraid alone.  Or angry.  Or stupid.  Or joyful.  Or silly.

So I will cook up my word recipes and serve them up to you.  Please know how deeply it affects me when you swim up by my side in the life pool and whisper encouragement to me or tell me your own stories.  You become a part of holding up my arms to brave the doubt and continue my own calling.

I love you for that.

Dying for Forgiveness

It's a whirly wind of an evening and my girl and I are already in our pajamas.  She has tired all over her and her first "real" high school finals to study for.  We bought our dinner and brought it home to eat cozy on the couch.  I stopped at the store and replenished the candy for "my kids" at school tomorrow and it sits ready in the back seat of my car.   I'm settled in thinking through the day; the snapshot moments that my mind plays back.

I couldn't sleep last night;  part caffeine, part menopause, part the weighty matter of waiting on forgiveness from someone rolling around in my mind.   Another friend sleepless popped up in a tiny message on my computer screen.  "How do you handle rejection?", she asks in the middle of the night and I laugh soft to myself.  Irony.  "I don't sleep," I say.  "Give them time."  I saw my own words on the screen and had my own answer.

My friend brought me Starbucks and we sat for a happy hour talking in the store, our words punctuated by the occasional kid that stopped by for a hug or a scoop into the candy bowl.  We talked all things that we understood about each other and I told her I'd felt like disappearing lately; fighting it.  "I haven't been to church in three weeks.  I'm just not wanting to step out.  I feel like Vincent in Starry, Starry Night.  This world just feels too harsh to me."  I shrugged and saw her look off distant and fight back tears.  "I need you there.  It comforts me to see you."  I was startled that someone would say that about my presence in a big church building.  It caused me to sit up straight with resolve.  "Alright then.  I'll be there."

Then another friend, and we danced the happy dance that her new house would be hers to nest in before Christmas after all.    We each have  girls who are becoming fast friends and an eagerness to strip off what isn't real and get straight to the heart of a matter.  We've both learned hard things the past week and cried shared tears of lessons humbling.  She tells me of the cupcakes she needs to run to get to pass out to her sons' class for his birthday and waves a cheerful smile as she passes out the door.

I walk to the teacher's lounge and happened upon a Christmas lunch prepared for all of us at the school and felt grateful for the lasagna and warm bread; comfort on a plate.  It was fun to sit across from teachers' I don't often have a chance to listen to and hear their stories.  I stopped to visit the accountant,  self described anti social who I hit it off with royal right from the start, and we talked how to pay for school when I didn't know if I could.  It's funny how the least likely person can be your cheerleader for the day.

I checked the clock.  It was time for the boy's class to head to their room and stop by the store for candy.  I wanted to be there.  I'd sat hopeful each day for two weeks since the day I wounded him with my words,  and watched him pass me by without a glance.  I wanted to give him a chance to change his mind.  Today, he walked through the door.  I took in air surprised but didn't move.  I was afraid I'd scare him away.  He pawed through the candy bowl with his classmates, staring down fixed and avoiding my gaze.  He chose a piece and walked back out without a word.  After class, he showed up again.  This time I took the end of my pen and touched his arm just slightly.  "I know you're here.  And I'm glad.  I know it's not what you feel like doing.  I recognize the choice."  I hoped my pen had written that on his heart.

I remembered his father's words.  "Be patient, Tamara."  This was a messy business.   I was dying for forgiveness.  I was glad that my Father had already died for mine.

Ruminating Like a Cow

I'm chewing cud over here like a mad cow.  It's what I do.  It's also who I am so I do not apologize.  I am a thinker, a writer, a lover of people and what and who they are.  I am passionate when I care and sometimes it comes out all wrong and sounds like angry.   I will stay right there in your dirt while you sling it.  I will be the first to grab you and hug you when you throw the last clod, worn out mad or hurt, and wrap my arms around you even if it's me you're mad at.  When I love, I love even with the enamel on my teeth.  I'm worse than an old coon dog.  I will always come home to roost with you.

I am irritating that way.  I know that.  I love to know what you're thinking.  I love knowing what you like on your hamburger.  I love knowing that if you're mad at me you'll yell at me if you have to.  Because then I know we're safe for each other.   I am not someone to hold at a distance.  I laugh easy, I cry easier, I listen close, I pay forward in spades with hugs and empathy.  I make food and be silly and curl up by fires and roast marshmallows until they're black and laugh at your jokes. I like the zoo and speaking nonsense. But at the end of the day, I won't be held at a distance.  Distance feels like strangers.  It makes me feel like an intruder; like I'm being punished.  Like a waste of time and reason.  It feels like the invitation to the door.

I will push you past your comfort zone to take your hand and walk you into light you may not have seen before.  Because sometimes my flashlight shines brighter than yours.  I will stand close to you when you shine your light on me.  Because that's why God puts us in each others' lives.  And I will be the last to resist that.  I warm myself by the light He puts in you.  I want to challenge and be challenged.  Else why?

So "don't stand so close to me" if you don't want me wiping the mud off your hands after you've yelled at me and thrown the pickle off of your hamburger.  I don't know any other way to be but all in.  I will do the diddy wop dance to make you laugh.  I will send you cards with little tiny people holding balloons that look pitiful to make you know that I miss you.  I will draw pictures in the steam of your window until you let me in.

I like red onions on my hambuger

Lessons From the Week

I'm just home from seeing my boy graduate college.  It took him seven years but not for not being full of living.  He spent a year in Africa in film school, He joined the navy reserves so he could help finance his own college studies.  He rode a helicopter and took news footage.  The boy was busy.  But today, he has that behind him and Africa in front of him.

I sat across from my boys' father at dinner and whispered gratitude heavenward that we'd come to the place where we could join forces and love our kids with no animosity and send then skyrocketing to their lives happy.  It has been a bumpy journey but we've learned how to navigate the turbulence of the early years of divorce and come to a place of peace and positive regard.

I fought hard this week with assumptions and selfish ambition.  With insecurities I thought were in the distance.  It loomed large and I lashed out harsh at a boy I love and broke trust that feels like I'll never be able to mend.  I learned that what I wanted was more important to me in that moment; to feel okay with everything, to speak truth reckless without wrapping it in gentle.  I taste regret and a knot forms in my stomach as it churns acid.  I'm not enough to want to forgive, I "hear" in my head and I struggle to lay it to rest.  I don't know what the future holds, and I've no choice but to abide and accept what will be.  It niggles like worms in my brain.  I'll never be enough to love, plays singsong mocking in my head.  Go to the back of the line.  Game over.  You lose.  Send in the replacements.  I can never quite shake the feeling that when I mess up, I'm gone.

And it's then that I realize, it's still about me.  And I bring what I can't shake to Him.  Again and again.  He has me in His hands.  I believe that.  When will I ever be all the way together?  I saw the assault of social media on my spirit and my mind start to lie to me and busy me up with too many words and not enough "likes" and it was pathetic.  I learned I need to work to hear truth and sometimes I need to use the off button to stop the advertisements.

"Our whole class loves you!"  "I see Jesus in you"  "Do you realize how people are drawn to you?"  "NO,"  I say flatly.  I cut, I wound, I attack. I'm replaceable.  But  I put these affirmations in my heart box and receive them from my Papa God.  He's putting His hand on me; not to point to me.  To reassure my fumbling self this week....."Rest easy, my girl.  I am showing Myself strong in your weak.  That's as it should be.  I have you right where I want you.  In the palm of My hand, pliable, teachable, fallible, tender. You are not a failure.  I'm using your heart as My home."

I've pressed on hard to hear from God.  I've told Him I meant business.  That I wanted to know what He wanted me to learn.  And I wasn't kidding.  And He answered me and I swallowed hard like a sore throat.  I got taught because I asked Him to.  I learned He really is listening.  And He teaches until we "get it".

So.  Yeah.  It's been a week.  And I am a little sore of heart and mind.  I'm tired from thinking.  I feel like a pest with God and my friends, this wrestling and working out I've done.  But I know that my heart belongs to Him.  That much I learned for sure.  Because when I do wrong the first place I run is Him.  I wish I could smile prettier.  I wish my resume was exciting.  I wish my Facebook page, my writing, my presentation made me seem like I am sewn up confident all the time and I don't need.  I wish I had a more shapely derriere and comely shape instead of my skinny self.  I wish.

I've learned?   I'm none of that and to strive to be any of it wears me thin and I forget to be what I am.  I stop trying so hard.  And find that I'm loved after all.  Still.  That shapely butt would be nice.

"He hates you".....

....said the young soul, looking up at me through black rimmed glasses, thoroughly convinced of the lie.  His eyes were wide and his mouth was set firm with the harsh words he'd just heard.  He believed them.  And he was astonished.

"No.  He doesn't."

"YES.  He DOES.  He TOLD me.  I wasn't supposed to tell you.  But....I ...."  He faltered at what to say next.  He was wrestling with the guilt of exposing a secret he was incapable of helping to fix.  But he loves his friend.

I knew it was a heartbeat moment.  A time to speak words back that wouldn't make sense until the some day.......a time to guide a young man who is sitting in the bleachers wanting to make right what he doesn't understand.  Knowing that to help hide was only making it worse.

"No.  He hates what he's reminded of.  He hates what's happened.  He hates what he fears.  He hates what he feels.  He hates what he thinks he'll lose; what he's lost already that cost him so much.  But that's a lot to hate with no name on it, no face on it, nowhere to carry it.  And God seems a little too scary to hate.  It's fear.  He's afraid.  I got too close.  And it scared him."

"Oh."

"Pray."

"I will.  I love you."

He left for the weekend and I locked up the store.

Love does what it can.