Faithful Wounds

In the emergency room, one of the first things they ask you is to rate your pain, from 1 to 10.  The problem with that can be that my 10 is your 1 or...vice versa, and it's difficult to ever really know if we're communicating our pain level.  I've learned something recently......pain can be a gift you're willing to give someone if you love them.

Proverbs says...."Faithful are the wounds of a friend."  As a parent, there were many times when pain was something I had to allow my children to feel, from taking them to the doctor for a "procedure" that I knew would cause temporary pain to make them well, to watching them learn things...the hard way.... because I knew it was the only real way they'd learn.  They eventually grew up and realized the truth behind the pain; that I loved them.  I was their mama.

To be a friend, though, that's a more precarious position from which to pass out gift wrapped pain. They tend not to send you a thank you note.  They throw the present back at you and it cuts a gash in your heart.  Not that you blame them.  When you passed the pain present into their hands, you bled a little yourself.

I have a friend tonight who is mesmerized by a fire he cannot see.  I called out a harsh warning and tried to drag him with me to run away to safety, and in the process, it gouged him and hurt him and he looked at the wound and mistook me for his enemy.  And so I had to leave him behind, still standing in front of the fire.  It feels like pain and smacks heavy on my face like a hard slap.  I stand at a distance now, knowing that it looks like hate. And knowing nothing could be farther from the truth.  We each stand in our own emergency rooms now, assessing our pain levels.  He hurts for him.  And as I look at my own wounds, I realize, I hurt for him too.

That is love.

Stand, Forest, Stand!

I am a deer.  Soft and gentle; but alert, focused, highly sensitive to every snap of a twig and nuance of change in my surroundings.  I have been gifted with discernment and it has served me well.  I can take the "temperature" in any situation I find myself in.  I can be tranquil; playful in my world until I sense danger.  My head snaps up, I stare it down and if I feel threatened, I snort and my super power kicks in.  I become invisible.  Wanna know how I do it?  I bolt.

I've lived most of my life "on the bolt."  To do that, I had to come up with a foolproof plan.  I'd live separate from the herd.  They could see me but I kept my eye on them and one hoof pointed out, ready to run.  I would be a deer; I just wouldn't join in any deer games.  Living life as an invisible deer on the lam, brought with it a special sort of dilemma.  I didn't know how to be a deer or even if I was a real deer.   I began to believe I was a decoy. And the longer I lived "invisible", the more the other deer really didn't see me.  I grew defiantly panicked and began to seek out other animals that would take me in.  But I realized they saw me as prey and I hid.  I became listless and lifeless and my coat was dull, my eyes started to loose their sense of wonder.  I was an invisible deer with no sense of purpose.  I'd been left behind by my own choice.

And then, one day, out of the blue......another deer approached me while I was asleep in the field, exhausted,  and nudged me with her nose.  I was too tired to run.  She saw that I was weak, so she gently pulled me to a safe spot and began to feed me.  I grew stronger and made preparations in my mind to bolt.  But she came after me and sat on me and wouldn't let me leave.  I thrashed around and tried to bite her; I ignored her.  She would not let me up.  "Tell me who you are," she said.  And she looked me right in the eye and waited for me to answer.  

"I don't know," I said.  "I don't know."

That was the beginning of God loving me through another. I began to believe that I was loved.  And it changed my deer heart.  I have begun to use my deer gifts, not for my own protection, but for other deer I meet along the way.  My legs wobble and I start to snort and everything in me wants to bolt.  But my deer friend calls behind me...."STAND RIGHT THERE.  That is love.  That is who you are."

This morning, on my walk in the woods, I came across a deer in the path.  As I slowly walked toward it, we locked eyes.  I expected it to bolt.  Instead, it slowly walked just to the edge of the trees and I passed right by it.  That is me.  Learning not to be afraid to risk being a real deer.

When a daddy needs his daughter

My dad's first remark, when they told him "it's a girl" was a disappointed..."ohhhhh...".  The wife of one of my parents' friends quickly chided him with "Don't you dare go in that hospital room and say that, Chuck!"  He has relished telling that story many times over the years and has always finished it with, "That was the last time I thought that.  I never regretted having a girl again!"

I am an only child.  Dad always told people, "Why have another?  We couldn't improve on perfection!"  Of course, he would've loved more but that wasn't to be.  So instead,  I grew up and had six kids, which delighted him to no end!  He called it a good return on his investment.  He bought fire trucks for my boys and play high heels for my girls and spent whole days building sand boxes for them and painting their rooms.  At the time, in my busy mommy days, it seemed like such a big help to me.  Now that I find myself at the age he was then, and those kids are rapidly becoming busy adults themselves, I get what he must've been feeling.

Tonight, my daddy needed me.  And for now, he is safe at my home resting.  I listen to him ask me the same questions over and over, trying to make sense of a puzzle that is missing more pieces every day.  And on the eve of this Father's Day I am grateful to reassure him, just as he's done for me.

As you lay your head on your pillow, say a prayer for my dad, for me.  I don't know what tomorrow holds.....but I know Who holds it.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlsCKFOn7oc

Waving to Russia

I sit here in my 150 year old house in a small town on, quite literally, Main Street.  The air outside is cool and humid.  I know because I just opened the door to check.  A car drives by in the deserted darkness and I wonder where it's going and I wonder if they wonder why I'm looking out my door; two people, wondering.    It's 3:33 a.m. on a Tuesday and I am unable to sleep.  Not a restless or worried unable...just a wakefulness that invites settling in and making friends with it.  And so I do what I should not....I brew a cup of House Blend coffee and lace it with almond coconut milk.  It somehow feels like I'm living dangerously, caffeine in the middle of the night, and I smile at myself. 

I begin to tinker with my blog.  If my thirteen year old techno whiz is not sitting next to me, I'm in danger of erasing the whole thing so... more dangerous living.  I find the statistics information and click on the word "audience" and there I see it. " Russia"?  I sit and stare at the word and blink.  I typed some words and blew them out of my hands and into the atmosphere and they landed on someones' screen in Russia.  I marvel at how someone unknown to me and so far away heard my voice and turned to listen. 

And then I started to wonder about their voice.  What is their life like?  Do they have a white woolly sweater?  Do they like dark chocolate more than milk chocolate?  Do they like chocolate at all?  What was the last thing that made them laugh?  Is it windy where they are today?  What is the view from their window at work?  What's their best friends' name?  What do they worry about?  

My chair creaks as I shift in my seat. I hear another car go by.  I get up to warm my coffee.  And I think.   When that person speaks, God hears.  When that person falls, God sees.  When that person rejoices, God smiles.  When that person fears, God cares. Somewhere over the ocean, there is a person in Russia who is alive and, I pray, well who is listening to me right now.  Hello, friend!  Hello!  It's so nice to talk to you. <3

Words With Friends

On Mother's Day, I was standing in front of the mirror, watching myself as I put in my earrings.  My 13 year old called out from the other room "Oh mom, I wrote on your wall this morning!  Don't forget to read it".  It struck me what a different world she and I grew up in.  My mother might have grabbed a towel and some cleaning spray, had I said that to her. And then I got to thinking about the mercurial world of words.

Ernest Hemingway once said "All my life I've looked at words as though I were seeing them for the first time."  That intrigues me.  When I think of the account of the Tower of Babel, in which our language was "confused" for the very first time, I'd imagine those there that day felt very much like Mr. Hemingway.  Anyone who's ever gone to a country where a language other than your own is spoken , knows the frustration of trying to ask for something, the vulnerability you feel at not being able to communicate.   It occurs to me that even when the same language is spoken, we live in a world of Babel.

Words.  We mince them, play on them, eat them and hang on them.  We sometimes can't find the right ones or we loose them altogether.  Some of us have a way with them, others of us use them as weapons.  Words can echo or fall on deaf ears.  There are careless words, idle words, words fitly spoken.  Sometimes they're priceless, sometimes they're a dime a dozen. We can write them, yell them, read them, whisper them, sing them, rhyme them or keep them to ourselves.   We can start fires with them.  We can put fires out with them.  They can be gifts or they can be death sentences.  We can mislead with them or point others to the truth with them. Those of us who believe,  have a relationship with The Word.

When I think of the electricity surrounding words, the power that they hold, what our world would be without them, what it is with them, it gives me pause before I consider adding to the fray.  But only for a minute.....because I have something to say.

Exchange between a mother and son

On the occasion of his 24th birthday.....I sat down to write my son a note in his card:

"Caleb,

40.00 seems a pitiful pittance for what you are to me. It’s a violent business, motherhood. Physically, a human being lunges out of your body and tears at your flesh and there’s blood and gore and crying and joy without words to explain it.

Figuratively, as you hold them in your arms they, even then, begin to unfurl and pack away little milestones that give them wind and muscle to tear away at your heart and forge their own path. And there’s a different kind of blood and gore and crying and joy. And all of it requires a heart – or two – on the line, or none of it will be experienced. And I’d push my way to the head of the line to do it all again. I love you – Happy Birthday, To us both. Love, Mama.”

___________________________

Mama, I am so indescribably grateful to have gone through every milestone thus far with you at my back. The very fact that you and I both are still here and have what we have is a miracle in more than one sense. Our livelihood as well as our lives themselves have come under attack even from day one. I love you more than you will ever know. I always have… through the trials, and the pain, the anger, and yes even momentary hate, I still loved you.

I respect your ability to not only let me go forge my path, not only let, but push me to succeed and I know that takes effort and includes many nights of sorrow as well as joy. In short, we have many more paths to walk and joys to be had. And I look forward to having YOU Tamara Gray Belanger, as my mother to experience it with.

Much Love,

Caleb

and I wonder.....

Below is the image that has been plastered all over the planet......the image that makes my mother's heart want to tear through that crowd to get to the smirking face of that 19 year old bomber and rip him to shreds. I pray absolute and swift justice for the sake of the families.  For the sake of our country.

The pastor of the church we visited today displayed this image at the beginning of his sermon.....on forgiveness.  Too soon.  Too offensive.  Too divisive to even suggest forgiveness in this context. It wasn't your kid, pastor.  Your sister.  Your brother.  Your mother.

And then, just as I felt indignance well up in me, just as quickly as it gave rise......I "saw" in my head an image of hundreds of cars and buses making their way to Boston.  I saw thousands of people moving silently through the streets and gathering as one body, surrounding the hospital where this 19 year old boy is sitting, perhaps having felt himself to be the hero.  I "heard" murmuring of every voice in that body of people.  "God.  Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth.  Have mercy on his soul.  Have mercy on us all."

And I wonder.......what would happen if He heard?

2 Chronicles 7:14..."If my people, who are called by My name, shall humble themselves and pray...then will I hear from heaven....and heal their land."