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.”)

Thanksgiving 2

I’ve seen another version of this with a funny (but unnecessary 2nd punch line).  This version is funny on its own.  If this particular incident happened to you and I have broken confidentiality (j/k), I apologize.

One year at Thanksgiving, my mom went to my sister's house for the traditional feast. Knowing how gullible my sister is, my mom decided to play a trick. She told my sister that she needed something from the store. When my sister left, my mom took the turkey out of the oven. She removed the stuffing, stuffed a Cornish hen, inserted it into the turkey, and re-stuffed the turkey. She then placed the bird(s) back in the oven.

When it was time for dinner, my sister pulled the turkey out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing. When her serving spoon hit something, she reached in and pulled out the little bird.

With a look of total shock on her face, my mother exclaimed, "Patricia, You've cooked a pregnant bird!"

At the reality of this horrifying news, my sister started to cry. It took the family two hours to convince her that turkeys lay eggs!

Thanksgiving 1

I simply cannot continue to NOT post.  So, with apologies to the ASPCA and thanks to email humor, I offer this:

The Parrot

A young man named John received a parrot as A gift. The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse vocabulary. Every word out of the Bird’s’ mouth was rude, obnoxious and laced with profanity.

John tried and tried to change the bird’s attitude by consistently saying only polite words, playing soft music and anything else he could think of to “clean up” the bird’s vocabulary.

Finally, John was fed up and he yelled at the parrot. The parrot yelled back. John shook the parrot and the parrot got angrier and even more rude. John, in desperation, threw up his hand, grabbed the bird and put    him in the freezer. For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed.

Then suddenly there was total quiet.  Not A peep was heard for over a minute.

Fearing that he’d hurt the parrot, John quickly opened the door to the Freezer.  The parrot calmly stepped out onto John’s outstretched arms and said, “I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions.  I’m sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct my rude and unforgivable behavior.”

John was stunned at the change in the bird’s attitude.  As he was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic change in his behavior, when the bird continued, “May I ask what the turkey did?”

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Testing…Testing…Is This Thing On?

Whoa!  I need some sympathy here.  (Sympathy…not pity, okay?)

On September 28th my step-father passed away suddenly.  I got the call around 4:30 while I was out with a friend celebrating her birthday.  Neighbors of my folks were calling and trying to reach me!  I hadn’t heard my phone in the noisy room where I was playing. Neither had I heard the phone when I was out on the mini golf course.  The neighbors reached my husband and he called the gal I was with.

Handsome and I rushed to my mother’s side, took care of her needs and I left Mom with Handsome and I went to the hospital to be with my step-pop.  I arrived while the emergency room staff was working hard to save his life.  By the time I arrived they had diagnosed the source of the problem.  He had an abdominal aortic aneurysm which had ruptured and he was in very grave danger.  A few moments later he was taken to surgery where they sealed off the bleeding but he was not able to be revived.  He died on the table…and the life of my family changed.

I am a chick who is in full-time ministry primarily to Christians who are looking for help to change unwanted relationships and behaviors.  This activity of serving is what I have defined as my “calling” for a very long time.  In a similar way, I have also had something of an “identity” attached to what I do.  (Hey men, that isn’t always just a man-thing.)

My step-father has been both the lover and full-time caregiver of my mother whose disability truly is dis-ability.  She is unable to do for herself at all.  So, what is to be done must be done for her.

The same evening that S/Pop died everyone began to ask, “What’s going to happen with your mother?”  “What are you going to do?”

Good question.  Stupid question, really, but I understood that they were concerned.  It’s just that I was en route to my Mom’s house to tell her that her husband had died and I ONLY knew what I would be doing that night.

So, it is has 3-weeks.

I asked the LORD the other day if He had something to tell me regarding the decisions our family faces.  Within a few moments several things came to mind.  I think He was speaking.

“Pure, unstained religion, according to God our Father, is to take care of orphans and widows when they suffer and to remain uncorrupted by this world.” (James 1:27)

I’m also reminded here that the Isaiah 58 discussion of the fasting the LORD delights in is the pouring out of charity (love) rather than some sort of self-abasement.  In 58:7 it speaks:

7 Share your food with hungry people.
Provide homeless people with a place to stay.
Give naked people clothes to wear.
Provide for the needs of your own family. (NIV Reader’s Version)

Or,

7Is it not to divide your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house–when you see the naked, that you cover him, and that you hide not yourself from [the needs of] your own flesh and blood? (Amplified Bible)

Or,

7 Share your food with the hungry,
and give shelter to the homeless.
Give clothes to those who need them,
and do not hide from relatives who need your help. (New Living Translation)

These ideas blow my mind.  First, I think that Isaiah’s discussion is mainly that the outworking of true “religion” is to live it among the most helpless who have nothing in defense of their own interests.  However, the fact that it actually says to not hide yourself from your own flesh (or, flesh and blood in some) it seems to speak directly to my situation.

So many goodhearted folks have said that nobody would expect me to “give up [my] life and just take care of her.”  Still, it seems totally hypocritical to say, “No, Mom. You get a nursing home because there are so many others who have a need and THEY really need me.”

Truly, three weeks is a short span of time.  I have no idea what the long-term cost to my husband and I will be.  It will mean vacating our home and moving in with Mom.  Then we face decisions about selling or renting.  It means a really big loss of freedom for me on a daily basis and for our marriage and its formerly footloose, newlywed ways.  It means taking on a VERY physical daily routine and dealing with the many physical needs of my mom.  It means a drastic change in my career and what my daily life has been.

As things adjust and I find the resources we all need, I expect I’ll be able to return to some level of ministry outside of the home.  Or, I might find ways to do it from the home.  Until then, I welcome your words and your prayers.

Oh, and it turns out that I like Martha Stewart’s show AND could probably get hooked on All My Children.  (Why did the tornado hit only those starring on the show? I mean, tornadoes are strange, but really!)

When the Wind Winds Wildly

My life is in some kind of whirling, swirling event.  Wow.  I wonder if I will ever have a chance to write again or to sit across from another brother or sister who is searching for answers?