a ton on my mind and a cat ON my elbow...

i just had one of those days that could have been a disaster.  bad things happen when you have a day like mine and then listen to Chris Tomlin while driving down the bypass at 55 mph.  crying while behind the wheel of a car going really fast is never advisable, but sometimes unavoidable.

ever had one of those days when the idea of an all-consuming, all-powerful, never-ending love just knocks you off your feet? and all you can do is just sit there and take it? and all you're thinking is how nothing else matters too much anymore?

*insert Chris Tomlin here*

to back up a good number of hours, i woke up early afternoon  feeling excellent. after a fairly excellent nigh at work. birds were singing outside and a huge cat was purring directly into my face from a distance of about 4 inches. i had a Hobby Lobby shopping list that expanded as soon as i walked in the door from the best parking spot ever.  and then because i had 4 hours before a meeting, i crossed Vann Drive and picked up a new book by a favorite author in Books a Million.

that's when this guy walks in and decides to sit right next to me. two and a half of those hours go by before he decides to ask my opinion on the legalization of pot. i tried to find a non-committal way of saying, "frankly sir, i do not care." but he isn't great at picking up on subtle cues and keeps talking and then asking my opinion on issues that i either know nothing about or did not even know WERE issues.  this guy is apparently very concerned about the war on drugs and how this was driving so much of this nation's criminal activity. and i just had to disagree a bit and say that i thought sin and selfishness were a bit more to blame. 

the next 90 minutes of my life were filled with this energetic middle aged man expounding to me all the reasons he was no longer a religious OR a spiritual person and why no Christian could possibly give him enough answers to prove Christianity conclusively and therefore religious people were all hypocrites.  for instance, if God really was all-powerful and good, then why will you not ever find a case of Him healing an amputee? nota one! no matter if every human on earth all sat down and prayed at the same time for an amputee's arm to come back. clearly, God is not all He is cracked up to be.  there's just too much bad. the idea of a "good" God and the mere existence of a "hell" are two incompatible truths. 

i was at a loss. i hate discussions like this because he didn't really want an answer.  misquoting Bible verses to "dis-prove" religion and then not letting me use any sort of Bible context to respond is just not fair, first of all. he listened half-heartedly and then energetically blew off anything i just finished saying.  which wasn't alot.

i was relieved when i finally had to leave. but the conversation still hasn't left my mind.  this meeting i was at involved some discussion on real-life situations that are a daily reality for way too many kids. i know some of these kids and the thought of what they have to handle from such an early age is just foreign.

i left, and all i could think of was this prior conversation with yet another human who just can't understand a good God and ….

...and really how i have no good answer to that.  not that i can easily put into words.

i had a good day tod.. well, yesterday, now.

but i've had a handful of… years… that were not good. the dude in the bookstore probably made all the same assumptions that most people do about who i am, what i've done and seen, and what i believe. most people are wrong, but that's beside the point.

the point is that while i can look back and see how at least some of it played a vital role in making me into the "me" i am.  but some of it i still wrestle with, still haven't come to terms with entirely, still even have the occasional nightmare about. there are honestly some terrible memories i have, with no positive outcome or result that i can see.  if i could see the purpose in it, could see what good came out of it, then i would totally be okay with it- i promise! but i can't. 

but this is the part where good ole' Chris Tomlin comes on and reminds me that it's totally possible for there to be a good God who lets us make a choice to love because there is no love unless there's a choice.  and that God really does know everything, and because i don't there are tons of answers that i can't give to tough questions… but i know the One who does have the answers.  and it's gonna be enough for me.  there's a love that is present in this world, and the ones who are in tune with it can tell you what it does. it drowns out fear. and hopelessness. and doubts. and pain. and anger. this love is too big to let petty things like temporary insecurities defeat it. not to trivialize the tragedies that affect persons and plague nations by any means- they are horrible, some of them downright evil, but however big the evil is, the love is an even bigger answer than the questions call for.   THE answer, really. completely NOT provable by science or even rational thought.  there is almost no good reason why a God would even think to make us, and then go beyond our wildest imaginations to go redeem us, remake us AGAIN, after the incredible lengths humans have gone through to cut Him out of our lives and go our own ways.  it's a crazy, relentlessly insane concept that could blow out of the water any philosophy book in that entire little bookstore.  i pointed the guy to a couple CS Lewis books because that guy is so much smarter than me and might be able to speak to the bookstore creeper in ways i can't, and also because he's British which means you can read it in a cool accent and it just makes the whole experience 10 times better. 

i still don't recommend bursting into tears while driving, but i wholeheartedly DO recommend setting aside some time (while NOT in potentially life-threatening situations) to ponder how you would answer the complete stranger who asked you to reconcile a messed-up world with a "good" God. because you're going to meet one someday who might actually want to know.  and if the idea of that Good God just brings you to overflow with tears of joy, know that you are surrounded by a Love that is even more thrilled than you are.  and by skeptics who think you're insane for believing it.  and by a host of guardian angels who will keep you from causing accidents on the road if that's where you are when the moment hits you.

if you're one of those skeptics, i can't do much more than point to the bookshelf with CS Lewis. if you've read this far into the post, then you've already seen me confess that i don't have much more of an answer.

but maybe i don't have to.

a stitch of time

sometime almost exactly a year ago i began new adventure in crafts.  one that has not ended yet.

it is the cross-stitch project that i said would probably never ever get finished.  that still may be true, but i have officially gone over the halfway point sometime in the past month or two...or three. right now, it just means that the pattern guide has tattered edges and i've had to re-fold it backwards so that i can see the lower half that i'm working on.  the dumb thing is split so that the top half, with the symbol chart is on one 2-page-width side, and then the lower half's chart is on the flip-and-reversed side with the spanish and french translations that are telling me how to wash and iron the finished project before displaying it.

seriously?

i'm beyond amazed if this thing EVER gets completed.  the last thing i'm thinking about is "oh, blast- am i supposed to spot-clean this with: warm water and soap or cold?"

let me tell you, though- if that glorious day ever arrives, this will be displayed all over the place.  anyone who knows me will be told the feat i have accomplished.  right now, this is the only thing keeping me going one teeny tiny stitch at a time. i'll even admit to cheating a couple times.  because i refuse to go through the bother of taking ONE strand of a tan color, and combining it with ONE single strand of an off-white color so that i can complete 4 stitches.  they're right next to 50 stitches of a just-barely-not white bunch of stitches.  sorry, but they're all going to be just-barely-not white.  just deal with it.  the only people who will care are the few who read this and know that at least 4 stitches are the "wrong" shade of off-white.

i dare you to find them.

but i had a thought halfway through a couple hours of cross-stitching that linked back to a weird conversation i had with my mother.

well, let's face it. the mere existence of a phone conversation between me and my mother is odd enough to throw me for a loop.  but this one was just a bit different from the like… 3 other phone calls in the past several months.  not to betray any confidences, that's going to be all you see about the phone call; but between that and getting an earful of JD Greear while trying to decipher the hieroglyphics on this huge graph made me wonder some.  wonder things like how life is like a huge, freakin' complicated cross-stitch project that seriously takes decades and decades to finish.  if each new stitch is a new day, you have the choice to cut corners and cheat- but you also have the choice to follow the chart, put in the extra effort and do what you really are supposed to do.  if you had one day for every stitch in this project, you will live to be approximately 87.67 years, which is just kinda creepily accurate given the illustration here. 

but even if you mess up on a few days here and there, and even if you're SURE the color the designer chose to put there is stupid but you do it anyway… you're gonna wind up with a masterpiece.

your master is, too.  and believe me when i say He simply can't wait until He gets to display you and all His other works of art up in heaven for all eternity while He soaks up all the due praise and glory.  yes, it takes a horribly long time. but it only takes that long because He's got a bit more patience than me and knows what He's doing, and can do it on several billion people all at once. 

so, if you are on Stitch #8775 (which i am, incidentally ;), and you wish it were more like Stitches #8770-8774 (which i sure as 'eck do NOT, by the way), or a different shade, or if He could just move on and work with somebody else for a bit and leave you alone… well, He's not going to.  He is working toward a pretty ambitious goal and it will be worth it. 

less seriously: my Stitches #8769-8774 involved an awful lot of color-switching, rule breaking, protocol- ka-chunking and generalized craziness such that my boss would either laugh her head off or cry. so this lil' masterpiece is going to look like a completely different pattern than yours.  be glad and rejoice exceedingly. because i'm literally in a back brace right now. once i'm completed and in Glory Land, i'll dance like there's no tomorrow.  but while there ARE still tomorrows, i'm going to find a chiropractor.

Summary for those Stitch-Cheaters:

1. whatever you're working on, do it right.

2. wherever on planet Earth your mother is, call her. today. i don't really care if your relationship with her sucks or not.  two of my friends either just lost or are in the midst of losing family members unexpectedly.  "today" is the only day you and she have.  make the most of it.

3. you're awesome. be satisfied.

4. you're going to be much more awesome.  be excited!

5. go back and read #2 until it sinks in and you actually do PICK UP A PHONE and call her.

6. take care of your back. you've only got one, and you kinda want it to last a while.

7. i hate typing the word "stitch"- i need to stop this!!! this post is done!!!!!!! good night!!

a birthday note that i wrote... to myself.

usually i type these out first into a different file so i can review it first.
its 0215, so i'm just gonna type. somehow i don't think my previewing it is going to change whether or not anyone reads this.  chances are that possibly, up to all 7 of the followers there are on this blog will see this before i die.  after i die, i shall not care. sorry, but i'll be busy :)
one smart thing i did last year on, or right around my birthday, was post a song that i hoped to use as a framework to use this past year as i would look back on some day.  or week. or hour.
i felt like a follow-up post would be appropriate this year.
first of all, i cannot post a new song for this year because i am watching The Lion King, and "I Just Cannot Wait to be King" doesn't really capture my goals or outlook.
this year was a frickin' roller coaster.  not that i hate roller coasters- never been on one, so i can't judge- (side note: i did go on one, but it wasn't really a roller coaster and was made for young children.  i hated every last second of that ride and almost got whiplash.  i was thrilled beyond measure when a roller coaster expert told me that The Mouse Trap ride is horrible and the worst one i could ever have been forced onto.  i am justified.)-but there were too many ups and downs for a control freak like me.  which is good. the best way to control a control freak is to take 100% of the control away and then let her eventually learn how to trust, and hope that she doesn't get any stomach ulcers from all the un-necessary stress.  another reason to have a blog, even if nobody reads it: i can control it, and do things like put side notes in the middle of sentences and dictate which words i Capitalize and Which i Do not. if that's all the power i have over my life circumstances, then i accept that.
back to the follow up,..
nope.  back to my control issues. i have learned about these issues this year.  not that i'm a whole lot better at managing them or coping with them, but we've taken the first by recognizing them.  second step seems to be talking in the third person like we do on occasion ;) if you tell me you've never created an imaginary friend in a weird situation just so you don't feel outnumbered, i don't believe you. in fact, neither of us do.
*Mufasa is just about to die, so i need to keep typing so i don't get upset. no matter how many times i see it, it always turns out the same!*
i am glad for the friends i have made, the friends i know better now than a year ago, and i'm working on being glad for the old friends who are...somewhere else doing their own thing now. whether or not i ever see you again, you impacted my life and i'm happy about that. i'm never happy at goodbyes, but i know that i'll get some new hellos when i need them.
RUN SIMBA!  RUNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!
sorry...
so i guess this year, instead of a song i will have to make Disney-related goals for this year:
1. i will focus more on the Timons and Pumbaas in your life than the hyenas. (though i don't particularly recommend their life-philosophy, Buzzard-Bowling with friends is much healthier than wasting life trying to appease enemies).
2. i will find the beauty in the Beast.  i was never good at watching chick flicks, and i think it all started the first time i saw Beauty and the Beast and was crushed to realize that the Beast looked way better as a Beast than as the prince.
3. i will remember that if there's someone impossibly annoying around you, there's a reason. there's something for you to learn or do- whether it's to save a life or just to take your eyes off yourself for a second, listen, and then go all out for them- for the simple reason than nobody else would.
4. i will remember: some friends would swim the ocean with you to find something, some friends would swim the whole ocean to find YOU.  but only one Friend has done/is doing both.  and as far as my fears and failures go, His short-term memory loss is every bit as bad.
5. i will remember that some work just needs to be done.  if my only cheer-factor is the rats keeping me company, then so be it.
6. i cannot whistle to save my life, or make beautiful pies while dancing with woodland creatures. or sleep in a dwarf bed, surrounded by friends that bring home rubies and diamonds from work every night.
regardless: i will not accept snacks from warty old women.  or warty old men. or warty young men.
7.  i will not forget that i am a star!  and somewhere south of here, there is a precious little bug singing romantic songs to me. no, this does not bother me at all.
8. i will accept it when Rafiki clobbers me over the head with a giant stick. i need it much more than i get it.  if you are willing to step up and be the Rafiki in my life, please warn me first or accept the potentially harmful consequences of beating up a cardiac nurse.
9. i will remember that hard work is good, but too much of a good thing is actually a bad thing. Jesus put all kinds of work first, but He also remembered to make a quiet time a high priority.
10. i will not stop singing. the tunes may change, circumstances may dictate a much lower volume, and i will not usually sound that great lacking the backup chorus of sea animals, but there will be an on-going tune that sometimes needs to be belted out, regardless of who's around.  
11. i will remember that i am not the one holding the remote control on my life.

because i have no idea what this year holds, i'm hoping i don't weep later upon going back and reading these. i had no idea what last year held and i made it through mostly okay, with some scars and band-aids applied periodically.  i have continued my therapy sessions (aka AWANA) and everyone should be glad.  my patients, co-workers, friends, family, and all acquaintances have a vested interest in me keeping these appointments each week. little else will re-arrange your priority list quite like spending tons of time around 3-5 year olds. i strongly recommend it.

here's to more taxes and bills, and paychecks and pills, and friends, and parties and skype dates. here's to chocolate-covered-almonds moments, and here's to broccoli moments.  here's to quiet days, rainy days, busy days, bad days, thursdays, sunny days, and penguin days. don't ask me what those are- if you're having a penguin day, you'll know. 

here's to yet another year!

waiting...

"I do think," said Shasta, "that i must be the most unfortunate boy that ever lives in the whole world"... And being very tired and having nothing inside him, he felt so sorry for himself that the tears rolled down his cheeks.

What put a stop to all this was a sudden fright. Shasta discovered someone or somebody was walking beside him. It was pitch dark and he could see nothing...At last he could bear it no longer.

"Who are you?" he said, scarcely above a whisper.

"One who has waited long for you to speak'" said the Thing..."that is not the breath of a ghost. Tell me your sorrows."

Shasta was a little reassured by the breath: so he told how he had never known his real father or mother and had been brought up sternly by the fisherman.  And then he told the story of his escape and how they were chased by lions and forced to swim for their lives; and of all their dangers in Tashbaan and about his night among the tombs and how the beasts howled at him out of the desert.  And he told about the heat and thirst of their desert journey and how they were almost at their goal when another lion chased them and wounded Aravis.  And also, how very long it was since he had anything to eat.

"I do not call you unfortunate," said the Large Voice.

"Don't you think it was bad luck to meet so many lions?" asked Shasta.

"There was only one lion," said the Voice.

"How do you know?"

"I was the lion." And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said nothing, the Voice continued. "I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And i was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you."

"Then it was you who wounded Aravis?"

"It was I."

"But what for?"
"Child," said the Voice, "I am telling you your story, not hers. I tell no one any story but their own."

"Who are you?" asked Shasta.

"Myself," said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook: and again "Myself," so loud and clear and gay; and then the third time "Myself," whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it.

 

(The Horse and His Boy, by C. S. Lewis pages 172-176)

********

this section from The Horse and His Boy is what switched it from my least favorite to my favorite of the Chronicles of Narnia.  i never knew what it was like to be Shasta until i discovered that i really was.  this is the Narnia retelling of the "Footprints in the Sand" poem that makes no sense and sounds cheesier than possible until you've been there. and it takes absolutely forever to get there.  and in this world, there's no guarantee that Aslan is going to show up and explain with nice, clear bullet pointed-PowerPoint slides how every piece of your story fits together, how every trial was really a blessing in disguise, how every question has a perfectly acceptable answer.  if i were Shasta, i can tell you i would not have stopped arguing my point when he did.

the fact that Aslan even bothered to take the time with Shasta is enough for me, however.  being the incredible One that He is, He even let Shasta go first.  He invited him to, asked him to.

i have spent so much time alone and in the dark over the last several months that i can sympathize more than ever before with that poor dumb boy on the poor dumb horse. if Aslan showed up and asked for a list of grievances from me, it would take me too little time to throw it all down on several Post-its, color-coordinated alphabetically and by order of significance.  why the world is so screwed up, why my life can seem so screwed up, why horrid people do horrid things, why my problems can't be solved in 45 minutes or less like a tv show, why i'm not a princess and why there's no prince handy to fix my every dilemma. why people still have heart attacks and pneumonia over the holidays so neither they nor i get to relax with friends and family. why clothes have to be ironed and rusty pans take so much scrubbing before they shine.

but the greater-than-Aslan still says, "Come. Sit here a while and tell me all about it. Stay longer and hear from me. Let's talk." 

"Myself" is almost as close to "Yahweh" that the English language comes.  Yahweh- the first name God uses to introduce Himself to a mere human.  the name on the covenant. the name that began a relationship between Creator-God and created man. infinitely large and powerful, yet infinitely small and meticulous and detailed. the Yahweh wants to hear from us... from me.  i'm having a very similar conversation with the Large Voice tonight. and as much as i still struggle with the staying-longer and hearing part, i'm taking the first step (again) in trying. i keep getting side-tracked before we ever reach the end of the conversation that began a good many years ago, actually.   

i don't need to have all the answers to all those questions.  He's letting me see my story, not anyone else's, except how they are all really His story.  whatever page you're on, stop every once in a while, listen for the voice; wait for it- it's waiting for you.

bring it on, bonheoffer!

no, i haven't died- all 7 of you who read this can rest assured :P

it's just been one of those… summers… where everyone else has all this free time and can't wait until they can send their kids back to school and the heat backs off and they are spending their  time gardening and cooking and vacations and tanning by the pool.  and then there's me, thinking "if only i could get people to coordinate their heart attacks." because then i'd get a summer break, too.  but i can't and so i don't.  i've been working one or two nights, with one or two nights in between, for a good number of weeks and it leaves little time for things like blogs. or anything else.

but i have had just enough time recently (like, the past week or two) to do some thinking. (yeah...haven't had much time for that either until now).  and because i'm probably going to have to wait a bit before i do much of it again, my brain went from "oh-look!  silence! let's think about something happy, like flowers" to "let's re-evaluate everything in your whole life.  right now."

yup.

the problem: it's a pretty short list right now.  basically, i have a handful of values and beliefs that just aren't going anywhere.  but then there's me, and i don't seem to be going anywhere, either.  which just feels weird.

we're chugging away through the Bible and seem to be perpetually stuck in the OT histories, an endless cycle of sin, prophets, judgement, redemption, and then right back to sin.  a ton of those kings never even got halfway through the cycle because they were such jerks they got themselves and their families executed in an extraordinarily short amount of time (like, a week after gaining the throne).  

but more than the rebellious kings, what is getting to me this time is those prophets.  daggum, it is not glorious.  not at all.  i do not envy their occupation.  however, they didn't get to choose it.  they were told to go be a witness, to all kinds of people in ALLLLL kinds of ways.  and they didn't even stop to say "Yes, Lord." the next verse is them talking to others, telling them there's another way, a righteous way, to go. 

now the problem continues: in addition to those values and beliefs, there are a couple goals and dreams.  but for the most part….that part of the list is already done and accomplished.  the other few i don't have a whole lot of say in, or else maybe i'll toss them out or cross them off. 

elijah, jeremiah, isaiah, jonah, ezekiel- none of them had too many plans that God thought were more important than His. jonah disagreed for a bit, but he was overruled.  every one of them were sitting around enjoying daily life when out of the blue, God told them to drop what they were doing and enter into a mysterious and insane mission with nothing to lean on but a promise- and so they did. 

couple hundred years later, a couple poor fishermen and a tax collector and some of their buddies make the same choice without even a promise.  two words, "follow" and "me" and they're all in.  practically speaking, THEY'RE BONKERS.

fast forward a couple thousand years and then there's us.  enjoying our daily lives, not worrying about too much, making our summer plans… what if something random and crazy fell out of the sky and landed on your front porch (if you have one). something telling you there's more out there, and there are people on the other side of the globe that don't know about it.  and you're supposed to tell them. 

if that "you" changes to "me" all of a sudden i hush up. i feel like i'd want to be more like jonah than jeremiah.   jackson, tennessee is not exactly the promised land, but i doubt that i have the nerve to pluck up and move. 

bonhoeffer, in his eloquently composed "The Cost of Discipleship" had a section just on this.  we hold back- and we've been given ten times the promises and guidelines that the apostles were.  one of them was that it wasn't going to be easy.  but another one was that it would be totally worth it.  he lost me on a couple of his general principles, but i kinda wanna go back and read those sections before i decide to take on a guy like Bonheoffer. 

right now, i watching 3 of my favorite people on earth pack up and prepare to leave this end of a very long state and move to the other end.  they were told to go and so they are going.  part of me wishes that i had a place to go on to, to feel like i'm moving forward and actually doing something….and the other part really wants me to settle down here, get to the point where i'm more comfortable with calling this place my home.  the other other part of me is confused and politely declines to make a statement at this time. 

what am i going to do? well, i'm going to go to bed because it is almost 3 am.  then i'm going to wake up and get ready for work tomorrow night.  and i'm going to work as though tomorrow night will be the last time i see anyone there, knowing that at any time it may actually be.  i might be headed the exact wrong direction, but i do have every confidence that at the right time, God is strong enough to break through my brain and turn the lightbulb on.

and if i get swallowed by a beluga whale in the process, well, the life of an un-extraordinary prophet ain't all blueberries and bubble baths- but what a great story to tell later on!! 

another different sort of vacation

they just keep on comin' don’t they?

one of these weeks i'll get the kind of vacation where there's an actual break from working, driving and generalized chaos.

this time, after sleeping a little bit and then working alot, i was in my trusty little Vibe barreling down I-40 towards Virginia, specifically the Richmond area.  on both ends (or thereabouts) of VBS week, both of my grandparents celebrated their 80th birthdays, and so our whole half of the family tree decided we were going to celebrate it.  by working!!!  we were going to do some MAJOR tidying up, doing all the chores and cleaning and housework that they could no longer do themselves.  and then eat and play and talk alot, too.  and eat a MASSIVE cake.

i showed up early because i could and claimed a spot in my grandparents' house to sleep, and the next day  family members came in from 4 states.  except for the older younger brother (who is studying abroad in New Zealand, the lucky guy), we were all together for the first time in almost 2 years (thanksgiving 2010).

i tried the same thing i did last time i drove up, and left Jackson around 6 pm and drove for the entire night.  most of the problems i've had driving were dealing with the other drivers who somehow sneaked through the DMV and got licenses despite their general incapability of minding basic rules of the road (like, "NO!  that's INTERSTATE 81, not SPEED LIMIT 81!!!")  or trucks deciding that they NEED to be EXACTLY where that little bitty car is RIGHT NOW.  forget blinkers- those are for the commoners.  oh look- one of its tires exploded.  super!!! how many accidents can we cause in 1 hour?  i swear i saw one grin and add a notch to his dashboard tally last year.

well at night time, 95% of those irritating road companions are not there, making it in general the most time and energy efficient way to go, especially since i'm night shift and am most alert then anyway.

this time, however, i guess i was just not alert to the things i needed to be.  i'd been going through a generally rough time for a couple weeks, and was not completely sure that spending long periods of time with family members was the right way to relax (yes, a weekend is a "long time" to some of us).

all of a sudden, i look again at the car way in front of me.  the brake lights are on.  i slow down a bit, and 2 seconds later realize that i am gaining on the car much faster than expected.  i slow down more...not enough.  one glance shows a car tailing me, with a car tailing HIM.  (see?  it's not nighttime quite yet, so the crazies are still out!!!)

basically this leads to me doing a rather spectacular 65-0 mph in a spectacularly short amount of time and space.

as it turns out, there was road work involving a 2-lane to 1-lane deal, and there was a STOPPED (not slowed) line of cars.  with no scenery and a straight flat highway, i had NO perspective, NO way to tell.  there was some chaos behind me, but no accidents like there almost was.

i recovered my breath and kept on chugging.

not more than a couple hours later- still during daylight hours, i crest the top of a gentle tennessee hill and find the majority of an exploded truck tire directly in front of me.  Reason #73 why i hate trucks (there are alot...but their tires are a major part of the list).  without blinking, thinking, breathing or looking, i swerve around it.  hitting a truck tire at 70 miles an hour is instant death.  this fact does not escape me- in fact, is causes my heart rate to shoot up, my leg muscles to cramp on that brake pedal like crazy, my vision to freeze and goosebumps to show up everywhere.  it would have made for an awesome cartoon picture, with my left side tires off the ground, giant swooshes around the car, and the fastest "save me" prayer ever prayed.  ever. 

1 am revealed a deer in my lane, trotting about just on the periphery of my vision illuminated by my headlights.  i did the same move i practiced with the truck tire and again narrowly avoided serious injury, if not worse.

pssh-the rest of the trip was smooth as can be.  i did not need the extra coffee to stay awake and was twitching with relief when i finally arrived at 8 am and stepped into the cute little house where my grandparents have lived for almost 50 of their almost 58-year marriage.

one thing i find so great about my grandparents is how they take life- one day at a time.  every day for as long as he can remember (which is a long time) he goes outside during the summer and counts how many day lilies are in bloom that day. there were only 7 today because the patch by the house was almost done for the year but the ones by the garage are only now starting to come out.  this year is about to blow last year's total right out of the water.

somehow, knowing how close last wednesday was to being my last day to bloom makes me want to make THIS wednesday different.  3 hours of it are already gone!  3 more hours that were never promised to me.

but what WAS promised was that God already knows.  and He was there on I-40 (and the dumb deer on I-81) that night.  and He used even a stupid (stupid, STUPID) truck tire to tell me so, in no uncertain terms.  i needed the diversion- to quit focusing on what's "wrong" and instead to just see what "is."  before the "is" becomes a "was." don't miss or neglect what He gave you now, even if it looks really sucky- He gave it and wants to be with you for/with/despite it.

may you never encounter a truck tire in your lane, but may you ever live like it's RIGHT THERE.  because something, anyway, IS.

a differnt sort of vacation

i don't even know how long it's been since i've last posted, but it's been one of those...months, actually.  so this is more like me catching up on my journal writing as well as proving to my 7 followers that i have not died :P  so it might mean more to me than anyone else, but hey- nobody's making you read it!!

this is ending 4 solid weeks of pure, unadulterated craziness on the highest level i can remember.  some of it worth that title, most of it not :P

the pinnacle, however, was worth it, and a whole lot more.  i'm not sure how much more i would have gone through for it, because there's not a whole lot more that COULD have happened, but i'm putting a big ole' glittery star sticker by last week on the calendar.

VBS Week!!!

the treasure of school-aged kids in the Bible belt, the nightmare of, well, almost everyone else who's actually ever helped with the planning, coordinating, decorating, studying, organizing, advertising, UN-decorating, cleaning, teaching, or any other aspect of the multi-faceted summertime affair.

i could sign my name next to at least half of those tasks, but i loved it.  every minute.  being a transplant from the northeast, this church family has become MY family of a sort, which means Vacation Bible School is all the family vacation i get- a whole week hanging out at church with my family members doing all kinds of crazy things with one common goal- to tell people about Jesus.  seriously, how much better could it get?

this year, i was elected lead teacher for one of the two Pre-K classes.  apparently i didn't screw up too badly last year in the same position ;)  the only people who were as excited about this as i was were probably the other teachers who were glad to NOT have the pre-schoolers.  but on top of all the chaos outside of church, i was able to happily plod along with planning, remembering how great it was last year with my little band of 8 three year olds holding on to their rope going between rooms and hallways.

nobody told me my numbers were doubling this year. that part got left out.

the only reason i survived was because these were some of the best behaved 3 year olds i have ever met, so 15 of them was manageable.  they were even pretty smart.  and adorable beyond compare.  i have got to say that even during the expected Thursday Morning Emotional Breakdown (which actually struck them all on tuesday this year instead), they still listened better than i'd hoped.

for my position as lead teacher, the only part i actually had to prepare for was the bible story part.  other people took care of crafts, games and snacks.  20 minutes to tell a story, do an activity and hope like mad some of it stuck.  this year's theme was about how God has control over nature, circumstances, death, my life, and i totally forget what the 5th one was.  and because of… i don't know what, this year again the pre-schoolers had different Bible stories from the older kids.

what i DID like was that LifeWay is incorporating relevant but more obscure Bible stories in their lessons.   Noah, Jonah, and Daniel in the lion's den are great, but so are the other guys!!

but anyway, these 20 minutes was MY time with the cute little tykes.  completely surrounded on the floor by tiny faces while 2 assistant Life Savers (as i call them) ran around doing potty breaks, drying tears, hushing the back-row-ers, and offering extra laps to sit in.

i think the best thing about the whole week is that you absolutely NEVER know what on earth the youngest kids are learning, except that it's probably not what YOUR main goal was.

the first day our story was on Joshua leading the people across the Jordan after God stopped the water so His people could get back home.  then they build a huge pile of rocks so they would always remember what God did for them.  we built a huge pile of shoeboxes, each kids adding one after they said something God did (with...a whole lot of prompting) for them.  even the most rambunctious child Max, who desperately wanted to pounce on the tower refrained after i told him once, permanently securing a prime spot in my heart.

the second day we re-enacted the battle of jericho, despite the breakdown.  wednesday was about simeon and anna meeting baby Jesus at the temple.  once they got over the baby doll i was holding and making sure the pacifier stayed in its mouth (like Teacher, seriously- take care of Baby Jesus!!) i was awestruck that my impromptu idea worked- we had every kid take a turn holding the baby doll and saying their bible verse ("God loved us and sent His son Jesus.") then each kid got to hug it and pass it on.  there was this serene quiet, entirely out of place in a room with 15 pre-K-ers.  but they loved it. 

i think the funniest part of all VBS with these kids was thursday.  i was struggling because i'd just worked my 3rd night shift at the hospital for the week and was running on fumes and donuts by this point.  and our story was about Jesus and Mary Magdalene in the garden after the resurrection and how amazing it is that Jesus ROSE FROM THE STINKIN' DEAD after dying for our sins, securing our faith in this world and our eternity in the next world coming.  kinda epic, huh? 

okay, first of all, they can't even PRONOUNCE "mary magdalene." much less remember it 5 seconds later.

additionally, they have no real concept of death.  at all. they've never lost a parent or friend or anyone close to death and if they have they don't remember it or think they're sleeping. 

my assistant teacher assured me i did a great job and that they were all listening, but i could tell that they could honestly care less.  i still thought it was funny- the best, most incredible even in all history… and the significance was 100% lost on them!! 

my one wish for this week is that i am still around when the lightbulb turns on for at least one of them.  when suddenly a non-dead best friend stopping the exhausted tears of a lonely woman in the early morning garden… when that story becomes more exciting than an army marching around a city and having the walls fall down with a shout.

anyway, coming back friday, i held up the previous day's picture and got- nothing.  a quick review of each story's big color picture revealed that monday and tuesday were still the highlight and simeon, anna and mary will just have to chill.  our last story was about the Good Samaritan and how we can't give God a hug or share our toys with Him or have a cheeseburger and milkshake lunch date with Him, we can do the same things for a friend… or even better, a non-friend or stranger, and show God we love Him that way instead.

i think the most life-changing 5 seconds of those 20 minutes were immediately following when i told these wonderful, well-behaved children that some GROWN UPS actually picked up some rocks and sticks and HIT ANOTHER ADULT.  they were shocked.  i actually heard a gasp or two.  leaving him to die by the side of the road was almost too much for them to handle.  i was fighting back laughter at the impact this story was having on their minds (especially post resurrection-storytime).  i got such a kick we all told the story AGAIN to 3 kids who missed it due to an emergency potty break.  they couldn't possibly believe that 2 men would walk on past, but were all relieved when Mr. Good Samaritan came by and put some "special band-aids" on his "ouchies" (or "boo-boos").  which led to all of them showing off the cuts, scrapes, and bruises that covered their ankles, legs, arms and faces. 

but they ALL know that God stopped the water so His people could get back home.  and Jaelyn always remembers the part about building a tower to remember what God has done.

i'm positive i'm the only one who missed VBS so much last week, after i slept for an entire weekend to recover.  i still have a couple songs going through my head, but i'm okay with that.  they will tide me over until AWANA starts again :)

so there was absolutely no rest (like, literally) for me that whole week physically, but in every other way i was refreshed- hopefully enough until next year!!