Your Thoughts Wanted

Years ago I read the following from Joni Erickson Tada’s book, “A Step Further.”

It’s a kind of scale, I finally reasoned. Every person alive fits somewhere onto a scale of suffering that ranges from little to much.

And it’s true. Wherever we happen to be on that scale-that is, however much suffering we have to endure-there are always those below us who suffer less, and those above who suffer more. The problem is we usually like to compare ourselves only with those who suffer less. That way we can pity ourselves and pretend we’re at the top of the scale. But when we face reality and stand beside those who suffer more, our purple-heart medals don’t shine so brightly.

Along these same lines I’ve been thinking about what we call the sovereignty of God.  In the face of suffering people talk about the sovereignty of God quite a bit.  “It must have been God’s will,” we say.  As I worked through the miscarriages, the loss of friendships and the death of a mother-in-law I wondered, I trusted and I prayed.  “Was this YOUR will, Father?”  I also muse that in the face of suffering we do not talk much of the goodness of God.   It is as though God’s sovereign-ness deals a hard blow to life.  God’s goodness brings only joy and good feelings.  What if both of these simplistic ideas area not true and a reflection of how we deal with ourselves and others as we move along the “scale of suffering” that Joni talks about?

25 Interesting Things About Me

Rules: Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you.

1. I am completing this exercise because I am curious about what I would find to write.
2. I randomly lied that I had gone white water rafting on the Snake River while I was an Explorer Scout.  I was neither an Explorer Scout nor a rafting veteran.  I persisted with this lie from 1975 until 1991.
3. The first song I really learned to play on the guitar was “I’ve Been Working On The Railroad.” The second was “House of the Rising Sun.”
4. I was NOT the safe kid for parents to  let their kid hang out with.
5. Parents always let their kids hang out with me.
6. My best friend when I was in 1st grade pooped in my backyard.  I was both weirded out and fascinatd by that.
7. It took me into my adult life to work through the terror I experienced at the threats of two boys on my block.
8. I generally always understand, comprehend and appreciate humor even if it isn’t humorous to me.
9. Background music is distracting to me because it doesn’t stay in the background.  I hear it.  It makes me listen.  They should call it foreground music for people like me.
10. There are stores I cannot shop in because of their background music.
11. I have a hard time finding shoes that feel well on so my shoe wardrobe always suffers.
12. I am never bored and do not use that word to describe any feeling that I have.
13. The only obstacle to the love of cooking for me is the clean-up.
14. I am fascinated by the varieties of illustrations in children’s literature.
15. I can’t think of any place I wouldn’t like to visit.
16. My husband wouldn’t like to visit most of them.
17. I have battled a sense of homelessness for my entire adult life with a small reprieve in the first few years of marriage.   But, it’s back now.  It is generally inexplicable except that I haven’t had “family” in most places I’ve lived in my adult life.
18. I have envied (yes, envied) my double-jointed friends.
19. I am a good whistler.  I can whistle complicated things and simple things but I cannot do that really loud, call-your-friends-from-across-the-parking lot-kind-of-whistle, whistle.
20. My 7th grade fantasy was to make a brown pantsuit with bead work on the back and a leather, beaded headband and to sing some important, really great song in the school talent show.
21. My fantasy car (the one I wanted when I became successful) no longer exists because THAT brand of car has  really boring styling and my fantasy car must be new.
22. People are SO used to my willingness to share with openness that I often am confronted when I elect to keep certain things private for a time.  That is weird.
23. I could make an afternoon of watching “Smart Travels w/ Rudy Maxa,” “Rick Steve’s Europe,” and “Lawrence Welk.”  So, sue me! 
24. Driving is my favorite way to relax.
25. I don’t want to lose what I worked hard to gain for 19 years.  (No, I am not talking about “stuff.”)