New Vistas

In my last post, I was about to go to a couple of interviews for practicum placements, and I said that I might have an offer on the table by the end of that interview day.

I did. And I accepted without hesitation!

My university, once I had informed them of the details, was very quick to accept my practicum proposal (12 minutes, no kidding!) and now I am looking at being an intern starting in September 2018. For real. Me.

There is still a lot of work to do before I can get to the first day of my internship, and it will take a lot of hard slogging in between, but in this moment, as I have crested the hill I have been climbing so arduously the last few months, I can see a new landscape opening up to me. I see some of the road ahead. I can almost see what some of the journey will look like. 

Photo "Double Rainbow" courtesy of evgeni deniv at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

One friend mentioned to me, when I was chatting with him the other day,  that after one man climbed Mount Everest for the first time and stood on the summit, he realized that at some point he would have to climb back down again. And that is part of what I'm experiencing as well ... but I also know that I will have help. 

I won't have to go it alone. I will have the assistance of a great practicum supervisor, my professor and practicum advisor, my classmates, my employer, and my family and friends.  Even though I will be living alone for the first time in my life, doing things I have never done before, I will have a support network that I know will come alongside / beneath me and help me to adjust. I'm not worried in the least. 

Funny isn't it.

Next week I will be attending a workshop on the kind of work that I will be doing as a practicum student and the clientele with which I will be working. And then, in the weeks that follow, I will be working with my practicum supervisor to formulate my learning plan so that I can submit it to the university in early June.  After that, I will be taking care of some details that have more to do with accommodations, work arrangements, and transportation, so that I am settled in my "new place" before I show up to my first day at the practicum site. But all that will unfold as it needs to. There is the overwhelming sense that I am doing what I was meant to do - and that events will play out the way they are meant to play out. 

For the moment, I am enjoying the view. And the view, if I may say so, is spectacular...  

Quiet

It's quiet. But this time, the silence feels different than at other times.

I remember other times, other moments, even other places. For example, a week ago, as I was sitting in my dormitory room in Calgary, Alberta, with my roommates gone for the day and me finishing up breakfast, the quiet was deafening. I felt isolated, alone, trapped. I was thousands of miles from everyone I held dear, eating breakfast alone without their company, without their laughter and conversation, making do with my keyboard tray and my laptop as a makeshift table, and feeling incredibly homesick. Tears began to sting my eyes as they rose to the surface. 

Of course, it wasn't as bad as one time (one very LONG time) when I felt so very alone. My youngest child had died and the funeral was over, and the sympathies from well-wishers had tapered off, and I was (yes) surrounded by my closest family and closest friends ... but knowing that the tick, tick, tick of the clock would never again be interrupted by her raucous laughter or her crazy antics ... made the quiet an open sore.  I wanted to play the last video she sent to me just to hear her voice again, but it made my family sad, so I sat in the quiet - the cruel, taunting quiet - and suffered loss that no parent should suffer. 

A few days previous to the breakfast incident in Calgary, a classmate took me to "see the Rockies" - we drove up to Canmore, Alberta, (see my previous post) and I was increasingly in awe of the indescribable vastness of these wondrous creations, the closer we got to "The Three Sisters" peaks. Even though most of the time my classmate chattered away, in the core of me there settled a blissful quiet, where I was able to commune with my baby girl because she had seen the Rockies this close too, about a month before she died. It was somehow a shared experience, and in the inner quiet ... I felt close to her in a way I had not felt for a long time. And I knew she knew it, and that she was deliriously blissful and at Home, more than she ever could have felt here. I knew that she was okay, that her restless, anxious days were done. Happy tears slipped their way past my lower eyelids and slipped unhindered down my cheeks.  The quiet healed me, soothed me, comforted me. 

A black squirrel - July 19, 2017,
on the Mt. Royal U "Lincoln Park"
campus,Calgary, AB.
It nearly blended in
to the tree trunk...

A hare munching on fragrant white
clover, July 20, 2017

In Calgary this year, there were also times during the ordinary hustle and bustle of the day, when I sought out the quiet and made it part of my day; there, I could recharge my emotional batteries and gain strength to face whatever task was ahead. There was a lovely park on campus where I would linger either on my way to or from class, and sometimes both... being there seemed to restore my soul. Perhaps it was because it was so beautiful. I watched the water from the man-made waterfall tumble over the rocks and land in a little pool, close to an arbour with a little park bench inside; I smelled the roses and drank in their striking fuchsia, bold musical tones that sang to my eyes and caressed my nostrils in the breeze.

I was particularly drawn to the wildlife in Alberta. I got to see some amazing creatures there; to the locals they were a dime a dozen, but to me, they were remarkable: magpies, gophers, and hares abounded. Even the squirrels were different than at home: larger, and black instead of reddish-brown. They were fast too, so I was pleased to get a photo of one (see above, left). The quiet they produced in me was tender, almost a communal feeling. I felt somehow at one with my surroundings. It made being far away from home not quite so lonely. 

But the quiet today is different still.  It is a calmness, an assurance that all is right, that I am where I am supposed to be, that my family is not far away, and that I can rest and relax without worrying. I can close my eyes and know that when I open them, I will see the familiar - the jumble of cat toys and pillows, my books and papers, and the occasional cat walking across the floor or playing in an empty cardboard box. 

I like this quiet best of all.

Press Pause

What a whirlwind the last three weeks has been! I have been in a city that is three thousand miles away from my home, knowing only the people I have met online through my master's program, and often depending on the kindness of strangers, or if not strangers, people who are new to my experience. 

Three weeks ago today, I left behind my office desk with a note on it to not give me new work because I wouldn't be back until nearly the end of July, and I went home to do my final packing. In a way, it was like I pressed "Pause" on my work life.  That world would no longer occupy me for a period of three weeks. And so it has not.  I have become immersed in the atmosphere of students desiring earnestly to develop their skills, just as I am. 

Academically, this has been intense - there has been such a strong component of hands-on practice in what some have dubbed "Summer Intensive" (as opposed to Summer Institute, which it is really called).  I can literally feel my mind expanding as I have gone through these few weeks. I chuckle when I remember how the smallest of skills posed such a problem for me at first, and then, looking back, I wonder what all the fuss was about. My confidence in my abilities has increased exponentially. Yes, academically, it has been a good experience. It will stand me in good stead in my practicum, but that won't happen until 13 months or so from now.

As challenging and invigorating as that has been, physically, it has been exhausting. It took me a few days to realize that I was lagging behind other people and feeling out of breath all the time because I was 3,500 feet higher above sea level than I was used to being! Altitude sickness includes symptoms of fatigue, shortness of breath, acute insomnia, headaches and joint aches ....and I had it all!  It lasted for almost two weeks! About a week after getting here, I was given the opportunity to book a place in residence (on the campus). It turned out to be a good move for me, as I could devote more time to self-care than I had in months. And now, a lot of those aches and pains have disappeared or vastly reduced. I can enjoy the walk to and from class now, and it doesn't tire me out like it used to. And I have even gotten some sunshine in the process! It's like I have finally been able to press Pause, to gather my legs under me, to get my bearings physically.

Emotionally and relationally, this period has been difficult.  I have been confronted with just how much of a jerk I can be sometimes (even moreso when I am feeling tired, weak, and lonely), which has led me to begin to re-evaluate my approach to communication in relationships. That was - and is - a hard (and emotionally expensive) lesson to learn. I have had to press Pause, to reflect on a lot of things surrounding my insecurities and fears about how to be a friend and whether I have the ability to be true to who I am and say how I feel without being afraid of making someone mad at me. I sense that this will be a long Pause. There is a lot to work through.

And then there's the homesickness!! WOW have I ever suffered from that!! Especially in the last week, I have been (as my prof described to me) "off" - not quite on my game, if you will. And that has simply been a function of homesickness combined with the stress of public speaking without the benefit of either raised stage or microphone.  (Let me tell you, that is a totally different ball game...) But mostly it's just been that being away from my loved ones is wearing on me, and I just can't wait to see them again!!  I went to timeanddate.com to create a countdown for not only the plane landing back home, but also for it taking off from here.  What's that you say? I got it bad? Yeah you bet!! 

Health-wise, this has been a pleasant pause. I am strengthening my lifestyle choices regarding eating and activity level, and have learned that I CAN look after myself (and yes, medication helps) and eventually beat my health challenges. My sugars are ALMOST back to normal and I feel less draggy and tired than I was two short months ago when I was first diagnosed with diabetes. I can foresee a day when things will be completely under control and I will be able to get back to activities that I had to give up because it was just too uncomfortable and/or tired to do them. (Golf, folks. I was talking about golf.  And horseback riding. Tsk!) 

Photo "Stone And Sand Background" courtesy
of gubgib at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

And now I get ready to press another Pause.  After this weekend, I will be officially finished this course and won't have to start another until September - and even then, instead of two courses, I will only be taking one. August is a month I look forward to simply because it is a breather from the constant need to stay on top of a pretty intense school routine added onto an already full plate of work and home (not to mention sleep, nutrition, and activity).  One less thing to focus on gives me a slight break in that routine. I'm thankful for that; it will give me a chance to reconnect with my friends and spend time with my family.

That way, when September comes and I release that Pause button, I will be energetic enough to dance to the music again. 

Even when they don't "get it"

When I was a few decades younger, my parents would never allow my brothers and me to fight. Not once.

When we disagreed or got angry at each other (which invariably happened) we were told that we didn't hate each other, that we loved each other, and what would we feel like if something horrible happened to that other person and we never got a chance to make things right? Guilt and shame were the weapons used to coerce us into "making up" ... we were never allowed to work it out between ourselves.  We weren't allowed to feel what we felt.

All that really succeeded in doing was to make us doubt ourselves, to doubt our own feelings, and to not know how to resolve issues we had whenever they arose. We were forced into forgiveness before we'd even gotten a chance to fully define the problem. We learned to be insincere and to get away with it. This had far-reaching repercussions on our own emotions. Depending on our personalities, we either withdrew into ourselves, exploded in angry outbursts, or poured on the guilt and manipulation to make the other person capitulate. 

 Nobody said that he or she was sorry. We instead tried to make it up to the other person by doing something nice for him or her. We also never learned what true forgiveness was. 

Thanks to Tina Phillips at
www.freedigitalphotos.net 
for this photo, "Young Love"
Notice how what appears to be love ... isn't.

It wasn't until much later (many years after I left the family homestead) that I learned that an apology is actually being sorry and saying so, not for being caught but for hurting the other person. And in the same way, I learned that forgiveness isn't saying that nothing is wrong, that I was wrong to feel what I felt, or that what the other person did wasn't really all that bad. 

That kind of mentality kept me in a type of emotional slavery to my own sense of self-justification. I held onto things that people did to me out of a sense of not only being wronged, but of wanting someone else - anyone else (but especially the ones that wronged me) - to admit that I was the victim.

I learned, through therapy and some intensive working on my inner self, that forgiveness is recognizing that there is a moral debt that someone owes you, but choosing to write that debt off and not expect repayment. 

Ever. 

And that it is a process. It takes time. Sometimes a LOT of time.

And over time, I also learned that forgiving someone doesn't require the other person to apologize or to change in any way. In fact, very often the other person doesn't know that he or she has committed an offense and - if confronted - would never admit to any wrongdoing. Or, if they admitted it, they'd go right back to doing whatever it was all over again.

Instead, I learned that forgiveness is not really about the other person at all. It's about the person who forgives. It's about letting go of the need for justice. And what happens when you forgive is that it frees you. There is a lot of energy expended in maintaining a grudge. Forgiveness makes that burden disappear. 

And it does more. It actually liberates the other person to experience the consequences of his or her own actions without my help or influence. Don't ask me HOW this works; I just know that I've seen it over and over again. And every time I struggle with forgiving someone and finally come to that place of letting go, I learn it all over again. 

Even when they don't get it, even when they continue on in the same behavior, forgiving them allows me to acknowledge the wrongness of their behavior, and then to choose to release myself from the obligation to extract my pound of flesh from them. 

That's energy I get back. That's strength I need to live my life every day, unencumbered by the torture of "what they did" or "what they said." 

Forgiveness, even when the other person doesn't know or does not care one bit, does what very few things can do in the inner life of the one who forgives. It does what Abraham Lincoln did for the slaves after the American Civil War.

It emancipates. 

Lessons Learned and Face Red

It started when the Shift key on my laptop wouldn't work on the left-hand side half the time. It was annoying, but I figured my computer was getting older and it was past the warranty period, so I'd have to find a work-around. I did. 

So it started happening more often. O...kay... Fine, use the workaround all the time. 

Apparently this is a common problem,
spilling coffee on your laptop. I wouldn't recommend it.

Then one day I spilled coffee on the keyboard. 

I tried to clean it up - but - it was too late. About an hour later my beloved MacBook Pro started freaking out. The J key started repeating when I wasn't even touching it - just jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj across any window in which I put my cursor! And my P key stopped working. 

Finally I bit the bullet and decided to go to a local repair shop dedicated to MacIntosh computers. It had been highly recommended. "Can you do the repair here?" I asked. I didn't want it to take forever by sending the machine back to the manufacturer to have it repaired. 

"No problem," came the response. "It's a simple cleaning job. But we have to let it air dry after we clean it, so it will take 3 days." Wellllll... okay, I wanted it done right. So I agreed. They cleaned it, put it back together, turned it on, and it was still not working. "Oh, the casing is warped. It's Unibody construction (one-piece), so we'll have to send away for one. It will cost $400 after all is said and done." 

Hmmmm. Well, it's still way cheaper than a new MacBook. Okay.

Hubby gallantly stepped in and told me I could use his computer (Windows-based) while I was waiting. I was grateful, but it meant that I had to use his machine while sitting in his chair because it was set up a certain way... and his chair was hard on my back. Not to mention - it's Windows. My Mac had spoiled me; I freely admitted it.

So fine... I could spend less time online. We had to take turns anyway, right?

Then Hurricane Sandy put a crimp in delivery schedules for the Unibody, and I had to wait two weeks longer than I would have liked. GrrrUMP. This was really hard to swallow. Days upon days of calling in. Not here yet. Next Tuesday. Friday. No, first of next week.

The casing came in a few days ago, and they put it together and turned it on for a diagnostic. Today. (Keep in mind that I took the computer in there three and a half weeks ago.) This time it wouldn't even stay on for more than a minute. More checking - and then they said that the logic board (also known as the motherboard - the main circuit to which all the other components are attached and communicate with each other) was fried. 

Funny, I thought. All that was wrong when I took it in ... was the J key repeated, the P didn't work and the left Shift key was on the fritz. 

They suggested getting a new machine; the only thing working on the old one was the hard drive. So there'd be the initial repair bill, plus the cost of a new MacBook which - straw breaking the camel's back - they'd have to order in. That would take a week.

I asked if I could have my computer back. Well, it's in pieces, it would take another 2 days to put back together.  Hmm. Finally I said, "I want my hard drive back. Can you manage to at least give me that?" 

After that, I went to the shop where I originally bought the MacBook. I bought a Windows-based computer ... thinking that if a Mac would only last 3 years, I was better off getting a lower-cost computer with top-of-the-line virus protection than getting a new Mac. Even as much as it pained me to resort to Windows again; I'd been spoiled. 

I bought the computer and paid for it and the extended warranty plus a cooling fan to prevent it from heating up too much (my debit card said ouch), and arranged for it to be loaded up with Firefox and Skype, and set up the way I wanted for pickup tomorrow. Then, out of curiosity, (albeit morbid curiosity) I asked them if they still had information on the warranty for the original MacBook - the laptop which was at that moment laying in pieces at the not-to-be-trusted repair shop across town. 

They looked it up for me - they found it in their records.  There was a year left on my extended warranty.

Oh crap. Crap, Crap, and more Crap. Wa-ay too late now - but I wish I'd known that a month ago!! 

I should have taken it to them in the first place. 

I am SO embarrassed. 

There's no way out but to admit it. Einstein was right when he said that only two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and he wasn't too sure about the former.

I screwed up. Big time.

Lessons learned from all this: 

(1)   Never assume the "warranty has run out by now." CHECK.
(2)   Know when your warranty runs out, and get your machine repaired where you got it, just in case. Keep warranty and repair records in a place that is separate from your computer's hard drive - because if your computer stops working, you'll want to be able to get at the information.(3)   Never, NEVER leave anything liquid on the same surface where you keep your computer. If you have to eat soup, or drink coffee or cola or whatever when you are at your computer, make sure that:

• you set the liquid container down on a separate surface than the one on which you keep your computer, 
• you don't hover the liquid above the keyboard (i.e., turn your head to one side to drink, or push away from the computer to eat your soup!), and 
• that the surface you set your drink/liquid on is solid and doesn't allow for spillage and inadvertent dripping on the machine. 

Life lessons learned: 

(1)  No matter how bad you think things are, they can always get worse.
(2)  Life does go on - and it gets more expensive. Live with it.
(3)  Don't take yourself or your possessions too seriously. 
(4)  Sometimes you just have to cut your losses, face the music and take your lumps. Life hands you innumerable opportunities to make a royal chump of yourself. Learn to roll with the punches ... and know that it's okay to be human.

People can relate to it, for one thing.

Rain Dance

The summer of 1978 in southeastern Maine was hot, sultry, and insolent.

At first we loved it. It was sunny every day, there was hardly a cloud in the sky, and the temperatures were hot, and got hotter as July wore on. 

I was working at a summer camp as a general staff member for ten bucks a week plus room and board. The work was steady, sometimes back-breaking, but since I was working with the horses, I had about three hours a day when I was in my element. The rest was tough slogging: sweat and biting critters (mosquitoes and blackflies) with no end to the joe-jobs: kitchen duty, food prep, and cleaning public toilets after every day of use by 8-year-old boys who had no parents around to monitor their TP usage (shudder!)

And the weather! The camp bordered a large lake, and we caught ourselves gazing longingly at the boats filled with sports fishermen from the fishing camp up the road, imagining how cool it would feel to be out on the water. The grass started to go yellow; the dirt got harder and harder. A creek ran through the center of the camp, and as the weeks wore on, we kicked up dust clods when we walked across the compound, and the creek dwindled from three feet deep down to ... barely a trickle. 

A similar moth invasion happened in British Columbia
in the summer of 2011

The first week of August was when the moth swarms hit. The streetlight just outside the dorms was eclipsed by thousands of moths in a mad frenzy to get to the light source - night after night for nearly a week - it was eerie. And just as quickly, they were gone. 

Yet still, no rain. We wondered when (or if) the skies would break. The heat was oppressive. Tempers flared. We tried to focus on our duties, and we tried not to complain, but we knew that every one of us was praying for a thunderstorm. In private conversations, we questioned how long this dry spell could last. The air was oppressively heavy. Everything was an effort. 

One afternoon around August 13, the guys and I (there were three of us who worked with the horses) decided to take the horses out for a ride in the woods and beyond the usual trail ride boundaries, to give them (and us) a break.

We'd gotten to the other end of the trail and into a farmer's field, about a half-mile away from the camp paddock, when we heard it. A low, distant rumble. "Is that...?" one of us asked. Then we heard another - this time much closer. We looked up. The sky had gotten dark with clouds. It had been sunny when we left. 

The field lit up with a blast of heat-lightning, followed closely by thunder. It was getting closer. We looked at each other, gulped, and wordlessly turned back toward the camp. 

The rain started just before we turned into the back part of the trail. It wasn't any kind of rain we'd ever seen though. The drops were about a half-inch in diameter, and they were pelting down ... straight down ... splashing off the hard-packed earth. Our clothes were soaked completely through in seconds. Lightning lit the trail path, coated now with soggy pine needles, criss-crossed with tree roots - the thunder was nearly constant. In the five minutes or so that it took to get back through the labyrinth - the trees lining both sides of the trail and and arching over our heads. Yet our canopy provided no protection from the pelting rain. 

Finally we reached the paddock and one of us hopped off his mount and opened the gate. Hurriedly we took our gear off the animals and led them back to the lean-to, where there was some shelter from the rain. We put some hay in the hay-rack and hung up the gear, and trudged back to the camp, another quarter mile - this time on foot. 

My comrades ran ahead of me... I figured I was already as wet as I could get, so I walked. As I did, I was aware of the rain pelting down on my head, running past my eyebrows and off my eyelashes; what didn't run off the eyelashes rolled down my face freely and ran off my chin in a little rivulet. 

It was raining.  It was RAINING!

I rounded the corner and saw the girls' dormitories: two large buildings. My room was in the left building, but my best girlfriend, whom I had met only a couple of months previously, stayed in the right-hand dorm. I turned right, went to her door, and knocked. She answered the door and I squinted at her astonished face. 

"It's raining!" I yelled above the thunder.

Her face brightened. "Yes! Yes it is!  Wait a sec!" She went to her bunk, slipped on her shoes, and came outside, where her hair immediately began to get as soaked as mine. She grabbed my hand and pulled me out into the dirt between the two buildings. There, we spread our arms wide, turned our faces toward the sky, and twirled, laughed and spun like little kids, splashing in the puddles and shrieking in delight. The creek was nearly flooding its banks, lapping up against the bridge in brown wavelets of mirth. Once she was as drenched as I was, and we had laughed so hard our sides ached and we were spent, we each headed back to our respective dorm rooms and began the process of cleaning up.

That girlfriend and I still stay in touch; our friendship has seen us through some pretty tough (and great) times. I think about that "rain dance" often. I think of it when I get too caught up in the past, or the future, and forget to enjoy the moment. It helps. 

It reminds me that even the things I think are bad ... can sometimes end up very good.

The pain drain

Ever noticed that things that you would normally not mind seem to bother you more when you're in pain?

I have.  I've been in pain - not severe, but pretty much constant - for the last few months now.  Just when I think I'm getting ahead and can do more, it hits again and I'm down for the count - and the simplest, stupidest things can set it off.  Like turning to look at something by twisting around instead of moving my feet. (OW!  ... Grr.)  

And the pain (as I was saying in my opening) wears at you.  Even when other things take your attention and you forget the pain is there, one move and it reminds you that it has you. You become more irritable, less patient.  Your tolerance for everyday annoyances becomes practically non-existent.  At least mine does.  

And that can lead to some pretty stinking thinking.  Negativity.  Snappishness.  Resentments.  Or acute (and by that I don't mean clinical) depression.  

Those things creep up behind you when you've been strong (or tried to be strong) for a long time, and they grab you by the throat, sometimes through the most innocent of circumstances.  It takes a lot of acceptance and courage to let it go and to trust God when there seems to be no end in sight.  Especially when the feeling that you're being targeted, singled out, and attacked seems so overwhelmingly real.  

It's precisely BECAUSE the pain is always there, like a slow leak in your gas tank...  that when the ups and downs of life happen (as they do to everyone) they seem to require more of you or leave you running on empty.  

And you feel guilty for taking time so often to fill up, to look after your own needs instead of everyone else's. So you don't ... and the cycle starts all over again.  

I can't stress it enough.  Self-care is so very important.  You are the only you that you have, and if you're not at 100%, guess what. You're going to need rest, recharging, refueling more often.  There's no shame in admitting that you need rest, help, quiet, a hot bath, a walk (or a saunter, or a waddle in my case) in the park, a movie, a night out, or whatever it is that rejuvenates you. 

It's not a luxury.  It's an essential.

It's essential because you're you.  Okay, if you want other reasons, it's also because you can't give away what you don't have... so if others are depending on you (for whatever reason) you won't have the resources to help them if you're not looking after yourself. 

I've put myself in last place for so long that the habit is really hard to break. You know the habit I mean.  Put the food on everyone else's plate first (after all, it's polite.) Put everyone else's schedule first and fit your stuff in (if at all) at the end when you're spent from looking after their comings and goings. Spend money on everyone else at the store but not you; after all, there's no money left to spend, right? 

Carving out time for yourself is HARD.  It feels awkward.  You feel kind of guilty, ashamed of even admitting that you have needs, let alone taking steps toward meeting them.  That's the old messages of manipulation from your childhood creeping in, things you heard at school, from relatives, in church.  Silencing those voices is difficult and at first, they will be loud.  Very loud.  Attune your internal sensors to pick up the wistful whispers from your inner child, the one that always had to wait, always got the leftovers, always was overlooked. 

It doesn't mean that you're selfish.  It means that you have your priorities in the right order.  Your relationship with God. Then your relationship with YOU. THEN your relationship with others.  

And one more thing.  (This was tough for me, and it still is.)  Embrace the word "No."

I think that tonight, I need to spend some time with a few close friends in an accepting atmosphere, and I know just where to find that.  :D

Getting Messy

We met them as we were leaving our neighborhood to go to our various tasks: my daughter and I to work and my husband to his errands for the day. Big trucks, backhoes, rumbling and beeping, roaring past us, coming in as we were going out.  We wondered what was up. 

My husband was soon to find out.  When he returned home, the whole street was filled with heavy machinery and large, heavy, rubber culverts and cement  access wells.  And every time one of those big machines revved up and moved, the ground literally shook.  By 4 p.m. when hubby left to pick me up from work, he had a splitting headache. 

What were they doing there anyway?  Well, they were digging up the ditches to install heavy-duty culverts, tying them into the town sewer system! They will eventually be covered in soil .... and seeded....we hope.

Now for the "back story."  

We had approached someone - a private contractor - a couple of summers ago and gotten the same exact work done ourselves, because our lawn was eroding and there was a lot of run-off in the spring, and mostly because it was dangerous to mow that steep a grade; there'd been some near-misses with our old push-mower, and someone could have lost a toe or something!!  The man dug up our ditch, installed the culvert, covered it with soil, and raked it smooth so we could seed it.  We paid him um, okay, a fair pile of money to have it done.  He was reasonable ... and it was worth it to us, to have it done. Peace of mind, let's call it.

We were the only ones on our street to have this done at the time, even though after it was done, there were the inevitable questions from the neighbors.  

Now this.  Now everyone's having it done (quite probably without their permission!) and GUESS WHERE the workers put all their tools and heavy equipment?  And the extra mud they're digging out of people's ditches?  

The view from the end of our driveway... the hedge is behind the pipe...
somewhere... :s

Yup.  RIGHT HERE.  Already they've broken some solar-powered LED lights, and made this huge mess on the very area we had paid to have fixed two years ago.  Including deep tractor treads on our nice, flat culvert surface.  (Sighhhh). And to top it all off, they had used our front lawn as a handy-dandy lunch area, leaving their lunch boxes and their garbage on it. 

That was IT.  I got out of the vehicle, walked down to the lunchboxes, and wordlessly and firmly put them, one by one, in a straight line and following a direct line with the culvert pipe they'd placed not four feet from our fledgling hedge. I took their garbage - a half-full pop can and the top off a yogurt container - and put it with their lunchboxes.  I did each lunchbox separately so that I could be sure that they were watching by the time I was finished.  And then I threw them a scathing, sarcastic grimace as I put the last item in place and walked into the house, shaking my head in disbelief.

Not a word - no explosion, no verbal tirade - nothing of the sort.  But I was displeased (and I let it be known I was displeased) with the lack of respect for our property.  When I looked out a half-hour later, the lunchboxes were gone, and the crew was winding up their work for the day.  

The whole situation got me to thinking (lots of stuff does that...for some reason.)  When we first got our culvert fixed and filled in, and the grass became firm enough to mow, one of the first things that happened when the next summer came around, was that if the neighbors wanted to have a get-together or a yard sale, the extra cars would use our filled-in ditch area as a great place to park.  Hm.  And now this experience with the heavy machinery. How accommodating ... for them.

I guess that when a person gets their life together, and the inner mess starts to give way to some semblance of order, he or she becomes a convenient place for others to to dump their own messes.  The very time that we started learning about emotional and social boundaries was the time when people started infringing more and more upon them - and we had to draw the line over and over again, instead of letting ourselves get walked on.  Kind of like our culvert workers.  

I understand that excavation of all that inner "stuff" can be messy.  My own process was, that's for sure!  And I can expect that when folks start to deal with their own stuff, I might get some of the spillover.  It's okay; it's all part of the process.  But that doesn't mean that I have to stop setting and enforcing my own boundaries.  It just means that I need to be more vigilant about defining just where the line is, given that others need a little bit of leeway.  

Like with our hard-hat friends today.  (By the way, they'll be here in this neighborhood for at least a week..) I could have thrown their lunchboxes at them, yelled at them for screwing up months of hard work in a few short hours. But I didn't.  Instead, I drew the line at the very spot where our own property line merged with the "common property" technically owned by the city: which is where the old ditch that was there two years ago, started to slope downward.  

It was a measured response - and an object lesson for me, firstly to know that it's okay to get messy when fixing a problem beneath the surface, and secondly, for me to know where to set and police my own personal borders while waiting for folks to clean up their messes when they're done.

Off Centre

One of my favorite things to do with my school supplies when I was going to school was to play with my geometry set.  I'd trace around the protractor, the two triangles, and draw circle after circle with my compass.  

Drawing the circle was tricky on thin paper because it was so very easy to allow the central point of the compass to shift in the middle of drawing it. The result would be anything BUT the circle I intended. The ends wouldn't meet, and it would look sloppy.  It took practice to get it to stay put while the pencil went around and formed the circumference, touching exactly where it started. That central point was the anchor of the whole thing.  It was tricky to get it to work!

Spirograph art - here's the link

A similar diversion was my old Spirograph set. Yes, I had one!! I eventually lost the pins to hold the anchor bracket down to the paper, but that set of little plastic rings, cogs, pins and pens brought me more hours of "whoa-isn't-that-cool" than almost anything else in whatever free time I was allowed to have growing up.  

But the problem with the cogs and the ring was the same as with the compass. It depended on everything staying where it was supposed to stay.  I ruined countless Spirograph artworks because the cog - or the pins - slipped out of the anchoring ring.  The result - usually a dark mark bisecting the entire masterpiece - was not salvageable.  And that was in the days before erasable pens.  ;) So, I found the best way to do it successfully was to make sure it was all anchored well before starting, and to take my time while allowing the cogs to carry the pen - while I concentrated on keeping the pressure against the wheel steady.  Just as I had learned with the compass.  

Everyone needs an Anchor that won't slip away or shift.
I know Who mine is.
I wonder what - or who - is yours?

Sea of Tranquility

I nudge my scrawny, 10-year-old body between two spruce trees, avoiding the prickles and dead twigs protruding from the bottom, and I pause.  I see a carpet of green grass, ringed completely by evergreens so thick that it is difficult to see past, and tricky to navigate on foot.  I allow the safety of this place, its beauty and quietness, to seep into my tired spirit.

My brother had shown this place to me a few years previous.  He called it the "Sea of Tranquility" - named after the same place on the moon - a flat place which was ringed in, protected.  I had visited here several times since.  

I pad silently into the circle.  The summer breeze plays 'in and out the window' between my bare, scabbed knees, war scars from learning to ride a bike.  There is just enough breeze to keep the mosquitoes away.  The sun soaks heat and restoration into my skin.  Here, the only sounds are the distant chirping of a cricket, the buzz of a couple of grasshoppers singing to each other, and the occasional bird chirping from one of the trees.  So peaceful.  So different.  

I lie down on my back, and lift my thoughts above.  The clouds are playing slow-motion tag, and I watch the birds swooping to catch flies on the fly, above me. My tense muscles start to unclench.  My soul drinks Creation in, like a desert traveler coming upon a natural spring.  Yet in the back of my mind I tell myself, "Mustn't stay here long.  She'll wonder ... and then I'll be in for it."  

The uncut grass blades tickle the backs of my legs.  I rub my calves together to take the prickling feeling away.  Slowly, the miracle of Nature soothes my thoughts, salves my troubles, and gives me just a little more strength.  The mental straitjacket loosens enough for me to catch a breath of the divine.  I allow myself to feel the caress of comfort.  I am not aware that I have begun to smile until a few minutes later, when I catch myself doing it. I close my eyes.

I hear a dog bark; it jolts me from my reverie.  I don't know how long I've been here, but my stomach lurches suddenly in panic.  Not because of the dog; I know all the dogs and they like me.  Not like her.  

I roll over onto one elbow and tuck my knees under me, rocking back onto my feet again.  I take one last look around and fill my lungs with freedom, enough to last me until the next time.  As I breathe out, my spirit says "Thank You," and my heart is resigned to what awaits me.  I tighten the straps around my heart once again, and squeeze past the trees, heading back the way I came.

Owning Your Power

One of the most difficult concepts I have had to understand and accept over the last three years has been what Melody Beattie, a well-known author in recovery circles, calls "owning your power."  

It did not make any sense to me.  I was painfully aware, having been desperate enough to ask for help, that I was powerLESS over others, even over my own addiction to being needed.  How could anyone - no, how could I - own any power that I was sure I didn't have?  

So I set the idea aside and concentrated on the tasks ahead - which were all about learning that people - all people, including myself - have boundaries.  Those boundaries must be respected.  Learning to let go of other people, to see and respect their boundaries, to stop manipulating, intimidating, and controlling, led me to the understanding that I, too, had boundaries.  That it was okay to say no - if no was what I felt. That certain things that people had done to me or were trying to do to me (such as intimidation, manipulation, and control) were wrong.

It was then that I started to understand what it meant to "own my power."  

It didn't mean that I had or could exert power over others.  It meant that I had a choice as to whether to allow others to exert power over me or not.  It meant that I could choose to take responsibility for my own actions, and to let others assume responsibility for theirs.  And that included their expectations of me!! I didn't need to allow them to make me feel guilty for something they expected me to do which I decided not to do.  Or to for something that they expected me NOT to do which I decided to go ahead and do.  

Owning my power has come to mean placing value on myself, the value that God places on me.  It involves making my own decisions and bearing my own consequences - and allowing others the same courtesy.  It also has a lot to do with not letting other people, their demands or expectations of me control my actions or reactions.  They have the right to their own feelings and opinions - but those feelings and opinions do not have to determine what I do or don't do - or how I feel or don't feel.  

For someone who spent her whole life trying to please people out of a sense of insecurity - that is a huge step.  I still have a tendency to not want people to be mad at me ... but when someone doesn't agree with my choices now, it doesn't bother me nearly as much as it would have - because my sense of self-worth doesn't come from them anymore. 

It's amazing how much energy that frees up to devote to other, more important things that I actually WANT to do.

Whose applause?

I firmly believe in giving credit where it is due.  If I appreciate what someone has said or done, I try to make sure that he or she knows that I appreciate it.  The words "thank you" mean so much when they come from the heart.  Which is why I say it whenever I can.  

Individually.  Privately.  

Public praise - applause for example - is a different matter.  As a rule, I cringe at giving it and cringe even more at receiving it. Especially in church.

Don't get me wrong.  When I go to a performance (say, a play or a concert) and it's well done, I show my appreciation heartily with applause.  

But that's just it.  It's a performance.  That's what applause is for; one performs for the pleasure and approval of other people.  (Of course it helps if the performer enjoys it too.)  

When it comes to what I do for God, however, it's NOT a "performance."  It's NOT a "job."  (How I shudder inside when I hear after I've been on the worship team on a Sunday, "you did a good job up there."  If it was a job ... I would have quit long ago.)  I consider what I do for Him a ministry TO Him.

It's NOT an "act."  

If I really wanted accolades or applause from people, I'd go into show business - emphasis on "show."  

I've noticed a dangerous trend in the western church: that of applauding people, and in particular children and youth, for participating in a service.  The message it might give them is that holding an office in the church is all about people-pleasing.  

It's not.  

My first reaction when a congregation is encouraged to clap for someone who has prayed, spoken, or sung ... is disappointment, because in my opinion, the applause of people diminishes "the eternal reward" he or she might receive by making "the immediate reward" the focus of his or her attention.  

I know that God has gifted me with the ability to sing; I sing to Him and for Him.  He is my "Audience of One." That's all that matters for me.  My desire for other people - if I think about them at all when I sing - is that they focus on Him, on how great and wonderful HE is.  When the limelight is on me, it is off Him - and that I don't want.  

True, I like to be appreciated.  Some of the more meaningful moments for me in ministry have been those where an individual has come to me after a service and said how the words to something I sang gave them strength and hope, or allowed them to feel God's presence.  Those have been precious times.  

But to take credit for something He gave me in the first place - this I can't bring myself to do.  Of course, I've learned to smile and say "Thank you," when someone compliments me.  But inside, I try to let that go in one ear and out the other (that way I don't get a swelled head) - and at least pass on the adulation to God - privately - as soon as possible.

Just like anyone else, I like to be thanked and praised.  But for me, it all boils down to whose applause I value most: theirs, or His.

Sharing one's Story

It's astounding how powerful the simple act of sharing one's own experience can be.   

Recently I was somewhere where a bunch of people were sharing their stories of how they had learned to develop a relationship with God.  There was one person who was really struggling, trying to figure it all out and getting more and more frustrated and angry that nothing was working.  This person freely admitted not having a personal relationship with God.  In the next breath the person talked about trying to dredge up the past and deal with it, yet the tone this person used was so resentful, hurt and bewildered that family members did not seem to understand and sympathize.  

I could relate.  Not long ago I had those very same reactions, flailing around in my own cesspool of long-standing resentments, grudges, and all the while wanting someone else to fix me.  Yet in trying to unearth the past without giving the whole process over to God first, all I ended up doing was digging dirt all over myself; there was nowhere else to put it because the more I tried to put it on my family members, the more I got all over myself!!  I wanted to speak up and say that without God in the picture - all that introspection and reliving old memories was for nothing. 

But as I listened, I decided to unhook, to give even this uncomfortable experience over to God. 

When the person was finished speaking, another person spoke up - and told a story of years of struggling to deal with all kinds of baggage without God and how that did NOT work, then how in desperation that willingness to consider that God might be part of the solution came to be - how there was now a growing relationship and reliance on Him, and how a transformation has slowly taken place ever since.  The story was so powerful as we listened - some drinking it in because they'd never heard it, and some marveling in the miracle because we'd seen the 'before picture' and we've watched in gratitude and wonder as the transformation has taken place.  All of us knew that God was present.  The sense of His presence was almost tangible.  It was a tremendously powerful moment.  

I remember, many years ago when I first started going to the church I go to now, how my whole family thought I was such a traitor for leaving their denomination.  One family member expressed her genuine concern that I was "seeking after experience."  She said it like it was a bad thing.  I remember being baffled by that.  "Isn't that what the Christian life is?" I asked.  "An experience with the living God?"  And I watched her struggle for words ... words that never came.  For, I realized shortly afterward, a person can dismiss advice, can argue belief, can disagree with opinion.  But experience is irrefutable.  

I've seen it happen over and over again.  Just like the blind man Jesus healed (the one who was born blind) discovered, there is no defense against experience. "I was blind.  Now I see."   

It is what it is.  And it is powerful.

Long after the effects of sermons, motivational talks and the like have worn off, someone's story will be remembered, looked to as an example of what God can do in a life.  This kind of honesty has helped rescue more people simply by them coming to the conclusion that if God did this much for that person... maybe He'll do it for me.  Another's experience can give strength and hope to those who have none; it must never be underestimated.

Guardians

Occasionally I have benefited from the protection of supernatural beings sent by (as "The Message" describes Him) the God-of-angel-armies (aka the Lord of Hosts).  I've known protection in perilous interpersonal situations, potentially fatal car accidents, even a near-slip on an icy sidewalk.

I firmly believe that these angelic beings exist.  But I'm not about to worship them or pray to them.  They are messengers only.  I can thank the Creator for them, though - several times in my life I have known that they were with me, doing God's will concerning me, without my even being able to see.

The simpering, wimpy image of angels popularized in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance is not what I envision.  Neither do I think of people who have passed away trying to "earn their wings".  I think of powerful spiritual beings specifically created to worship God, to do God's will, and to intervene in the lives of people.  Huge creatures - at least 10 feet tall.  

Warriors. Guardians.

They protect the innocent, shield them from worse things happening to them.  They wage war with their counterparts in battles we cannot begin to imagine in a dimension that is rarely if ever perceived by humans.  They watch us and marvel at the opportunity we have to develop a personal relationship with God.

Ministering spirits, the Bible calls them, sent to minister grace (in this context, strength) to those who are the children of God.  

Yes.  Superhuman strength.  

Too Much

So to update you on my last post, my brother was supposed to have a dye test but opted out of it because it is hard on the kidneys ...and so they'll keep him on blood-thinners and have him do a stress test on Thursday.  They gave him something last night to calm him down and help him sleep, and he had a good day - was even sitting up in his room watching informational videos when I called the nurse's station today.

When he had the heart attack, he had been having a few 'episodes' of fluttering in his chest, and the more stress he was under, the worse it got.  He was in a situation he hated, enduring the toxicity of attitude of someone on whom he would be relying on to get to a doctor's appointment - and his body couldn't take it anymore. That his artery was blocked only provided the ideal atmosphere for such an attack to happen.  It had been building for years.

There's something really revealing about having your life reduced to a bunch of numbers and squiggly lines on a screen and hearing that beep-beep-beep of a heart monitor.  

It exposes - in real time - all the stresses, all the secrets you've been keeping from your loved ones: increased heart rate, shallow breathing, high blood pressure, poor lung capacity.  Things you store up inside yourself, feelings you push down because they're not "acceptable" or "Christian" to feel - these are the things your body screams out loud when hooked up to the machines that reveal oxygen saturation, breaths per minute, electrical activity in the skin, fast or slow heart beat, and the most revealing one for stress levels: blood pressure.

The body is like a sink into which is poured all kinds of "non-body" things: emotions, experiences, circumstances, thoughts, beliefs, the list is endless.

If there's an outlet for all that, it's all good.  The body can handle all those things and leave room for more. But when yesterday's built-up stuff is clogging the drain, then it's not about today anymore.  It's about the clog - because life still happens: circumstances, other people's stuff, the economic climate, world events, family upheavals, work (or lack of it). If yesterday's stuff clogs the outlet, then there is only so much new stuff that the body can take before it spills over into one big mess.

The process of healing is first admitting that there's a clog and that we can't clean it out ourselves - NOR can we turn off the tap of stuff that keeps happening.  We admit that we need help.  We ask God to be that providential plumber who gets His hands dirty and unclogs the sink.  But it doesn't stop there.  We identify those things, one by one (in specifics) and give them to Him.  We do it in specifics, because until we do, we will never admit to ourselves that it's there.  And we'll never be fed up of our inability to do anything about it, at least not enough to want to change, to want to have God remove those things from us.  

Honesty is key to the process of healing.

And once the clog is cleared - it's important to keep it from clogging again, to express our feelings in a safe way, and live one day at a time.

Motes and Beams

It's one of my favorite scenes from the Visual Bible's Gospel of Matthew (starring Bruce Marchiano as Jesus).  It's the sermon on the mount and Jesus is teaching, "Why do you gaze at the speck in your brother's eye, when (and here He leans over and picks up a long pole and puts it beside His eye ... everywhere He turns, he swings the pole back and forth as the audience chuckles) there is a plank in your own eye?  Hypocrite - first remove the plank from your own eye and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye!"  His audience immediately got the point.  

I was remembering this scene this morning as I contemplated how a Christian could confront another (if such a thing is possible) about something in his or her life WITHOUT the latter accusing the former of being judgmental.  A very ticklish situation.  One I've come to realize - in my recovery - that I can't navigate.

Nor do I need to try.  I know that it can be frustrating to see another - especially another believer - jump up  and down on his or her self-destruct button.  If anything is said it needs to be in love and with a lot of what is known as "I-messaging."  But I have learned this: the person needs to be ready to receive that kind of rebuke, or it will do as much good as running hot water into a sink to wash dishes ... with no stopper in the drain.  A lot of wasted effort for nothing, in other words.  People will do what they want because they've already convinced themselves that it's good for them, that it's not that bad - and people resist change.  ALL people in their natural state ... resist change.  An agent of change is going to automatically incur the wrath of the one he or she is trying to change.  

It took me a long time to understand that I was powerless over other people and that in trying to change or fix them, I was really taking on the role that must be played by only one person; that person is God.  Since He is faultless, only He can reach into the  heart of someone and not condemn them but restore them to wholeness.  Nothing I can say or do can effect that kind of change in someone.  Only He can.  It's His thing.

As I meditated this morning on the mote and the beam (an analogy for a defect of character in someone's life) - I'm reminded that having something - large or small - in your eye is a PAINFUL thing.  And having it removed is even MORE painful!  There has to be a lot of trust - and hopefully anesthetic - involved.  And there is one thing common to every single removal of something from the eye.

Tears.

When God removes a defect of character from me, it is never painless.  There are lots of tears involved.  But the tears are necessary to wash all the residual crud out, and to help in the  healing process.  And there's another reason the tears are necessary.  They are so that I can see clearly again.  The pain literally blinds me - and when I let Him do His work in me, I can see clearly.  If someone else suffers from that same thing, I know what it feels like, I know how important it is to have removed, and I know who to go to in order to have the job done right.  The One who taught about motes and beams.  Getting the beam out of my own life also helps me not to judge another who has a speck in his;  it motivates me to act and speak in compassion and love.  That goes a very long way toward healing both in me and in the life of someone else on whom I have that kind of compassion - the same compassion and tenderness I would hope that another would give to me - the kind that Jesus showed to me.

There's an old Gaither song that comes to me right now ... and I thought that I would share its lyrics with you because they so powerfully illustrates this process of healing.

He washed my eyes with tears that I might see
The broken heart I had was good for me;
He tore it all apart and looked inside -
He found it full of fear and foolish pride.
He swept away the things that made me blind
And then I saw the clouds were silver lined;
And now I understand 'twas best for me
He washed my eyes with tears that I might see.

He washed my eyes with tears that I might see
The glory of Himself revealed to me;
I did not know that He had wounded hands - 
I saw the blood He spilt upon the sands.
I saw the marks of shame and wept and cried;
He was my substitute!  for me He died;
And now I'm glad He came so tenderly
And washed my eyes with tears that I might see.

Where everybody knows your name

I just spent an hour and a half with people I trust in a safe atmosphere.  When I entered that place, my mind was racing with the events of the day, filled with frenetic activity and unable to settle down.  

Just thirty minutes into that time where everyone knew who I was and they were still glad to see me - that was enough to let me relax and let down my guard.

There's an old song to a TV show I used to watch - a TV program called "Cheers" - and the chorus to the theme song goes, "Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name - and they're always glad you came!  You wanna go where people know that people are all the same; you wanna go where everybody knows your name."

And I do.  I've spent most of my life hanging around people who expected me to be someone I wasn't.  And it's good to know I can be me with these friends and I don't have to prove anything to anyone.  The only requirement for friendship with these people is that I am real, honest, open, and willing to embrace change as long as it's God who does the changing.  I could really get behind that.

Coach, Sam, Carla, Dianne, Cliffy and "Norm" always made me so wistful when I watched how they interacted and just accepted each other.  I never knew why.  Going to bars wasn't my thing - still isn't. It wasn't the fact that it was a bar (and don't get me wrong - some bars got more God than most churches!!) but it was the atmosphere I longed for and didn't know where to find.  And then I met this group of people with whom I was hanging out with tonight - and I knew I had come into my own.  

That's where I wanna go.

What's so Awful about Weakness?

People come in all shapes, sizes, abilities, strengths, weaknesses, and types of intelligence.

What's the first thing you notice about a businessman who happens to be using crutches? Is his immaculate suit and tie? Is it the smile on his face or the color of his hair (or that he even HAS hair?)

Or is it the crutches?

Okay, I get it that people don't want to be sick, or weak, or in some way "less" than what is considered the norm. Parents don't want that for their children - the teasing, the limitations, and other lessened joys in life. (Lessened compared to what? especially if they've never known anything different?)

Anyway, I heard someone talking about their infant who had a problem with one of his senses - for the sake of argument let's say he needed really thick glasses for the rest of his life. First, is he less of a person because he can't see as well as those who don't need glasses? Second, how will that limit him in any appreciable way? Why then, did this person get all kinds of comments like, "Oh that's awful! God can heal him - let's all agree together in prayer; He can do the impossible!!"

Don't get me wrong; I believe that God can heal anybody if He wants to. I just don't think He necessarily wants to in EVERY case. What if God knows that this young fellow (as happened with my husband) will be in a room one day when a bunch of acid explodes in a chemical reaction? those thick glasses will keep him from going blind!! What if the visual disability keeps him from going into a career where he would most likely be killed before he could accomplish all that God had initially planned for him? Like say, the military? What if God uses this young person's inability to see well to teach someone else a lesson and turn their life around in a way that nothing else could? Some of the most amazing people I've known had significant physical limitations, mental difficulties, or intellectual challenges - which made them all the more amazing for their steadfast faith, their persistent and loyal love for their family and friends, and their passion for the lost.

In fact, the apostle Paul boasted about his weaknesses, about his physical limitations, because he knew that when people looked at him they thought, "What a wimpy little weakling of a man! Bow-legged, near-sighted, waddles when he walks! ... but there's something about him that's so compelling. This God of his must be pretty impressive to make him this passionate..." and we know that hundreds followed Jesus because of Paul's witness. Of those, dozens were healed of all kinds of sicknesses. Yet Paul himself was not. Three times he asked, and finally Jesus told him, "My grace is enough for you; My strength shines even brighter in your weakness."

So what's so awful about it?