Reflections on "A Really Kindred Spirit"

"Marilla," she demanded presently, "Do you think that I shall ever have a bosom friend in Avonlea?"

"A--a what kind of friend?"

"A bosom friend—an intimate friend, you know—a really kindred spirit to whom I can confide my inmost soul. I've dreamed of meeting her all my life. I never really supposed I would, but so many of my loveliest dreams have come true all at once that perhaps this one will, too. Do you think it's possible?"

Yes, it's possible, dear Anne of Green Gables. But it's a rare and special thing to be treasured among the highest of treasures!

Below you will find some thoughts milling around in my head about friendship. They are shared in the form of an email I received from a dear friend, and an email I wrote to my precious family. 

We're in the final stretch of wedding planning and execution around here, and I have no time for blogging about any of it! (The only thing I'll say about that is this: Go hug your sweet little ones. Next week, they'll be driving you around, and the week after that they'll be getting married. Don't blink!)

My loves,

Some of this is addressed to my sweet daughters and some of it to my dear men, but I wrote it intending for all of you to read all of it. I love you!

My dear daughters,

Find yourself a few dear friends like this throughout the years of your life. I can count them on one hand, over my entire lifetime, but they are a priceless, rare treasure. (See note from Christine, below.) 

You will have many, many special people move in and out of your circle of associations over your lifetime, but deep, heart friends—"bosom friends," as Anne of Green Gables called them—are a true, rare gift from God. They don't usually come along when you're a teenager, (though they certainly can), and they are usually the result of "clicking" with someone on both a spiritual level and a personality level. You'll know them when they come along. Treasure them. 

(And know that I'd love nothing more than to eventually be one of them to you!)

My dear men, I cc'ed you rather than addressing you directly because men's friendships tend to work differently than women's. A deliberate choice to facilitate some connection with the spiritual men in your circle—for accountability and occasional companionship—seems to be key for guys. That, and a deep, heart-and-spirit connection with a "wife of noble character." ("Who can find? She is worth far more than rubies...") Treasure her, too, once the Lord brings her along. 

Dear ones, settle for nothing less than the best: a deep, soul, Spirit connection with your spouse. It, too, is a rare gift from God, and worth waiting for, and earnestly seeking. 

I'm so glad I have your dad as such a soulmate for walking this life together, and that God has given me friendships like those I've shared with Christine. Karen. Cheri. Kathy. Johanna. 

Keep your eye out for those special types of friends. They don't come along every day! And work to become ready to *be* that kind of friend, once they do. 

Life is good, and God is great. Above all, love Him with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. He is, and will always be, your first and closest and truest Friend. And He will shape you into the man or woman of God that He wants you to be, and that will make you the kind of friend that's a rare treasure. Like my dear Christine, writing from across the miles in Iraq:

From: Christine
Date: February 13, 2015
To: Laurie
Subject: Thinking of You

Laurie, I am thinking of you all so much as the wedding approaches. I am really bummed to not be there to help out. When you asked for Christmas trees, I knew you must be planning something special.  

Just know that I love your family and am so glad I know you and Iivo from even before dear EV was born. We have walked thru lots of life together, and I can imagine the thoughts and emotions you have as EV gets married. 

I will be thinking of you so much next Saturday and look forward to being with you to hear all about it! 

Love,

Christine

Celebrating Christmas

As we move into the week before Christmas, the excitement around our household is growing. Some of our family's "Christmas traditions" have already come to pass, and many are yet to come in the next few days.

This is an interesting Christmas for our family... our last as just our own little family unit of six. This coming February, our daughter EV is getting married. Over the coming years, our little family of six will expand into "extended family" as our four children eventually leave our home to start their own little family units of living and learning and teaching and traditions and celebrating. I am rejoicing through the growing pains, and I look forward to seeing how they will choose to honor the coming of the Savior of the world in their own homes one day. I'm sure some of our traditions might remain, having made their indelible marks and been found worthy of repeating. I know that some of those that were part of their spouse's growing-up years will mingle in as well. Most, however, probably will not, as they seek to create their own traditions and memories as a couple and with their own children.

I first wrote this post about our family's Christmas traditions back in 2008. (At that time my children were 14, 12, 10, and 8.) It has been amended and added to over the years, as our family has grown into (and one out of!) the teenage years, but many of the traditions have remained. Just this one last time, we're implementing as many of these things as we still can. And maybe, just maybe, in future years, some of those beloved "extended family members" will join us in some of the traditional celebrating at our place!

Here's the original (though oft-amended) post from 2008:
At the meeting of our worship team during our weekly practice last week, the "icebreaker" question was to share your favorite family tradition in celebrating Christmas. It was interesting to watch people decide which "life stage" to answer about—whether to answer about the traditions they remembered from their own childhood, or the ones they implement now with their own children, or the ones they used to implement when their children were still at home. Generally, the effect was that you got "the best of the best," as they had to choose a favorite from among all of those experienced during any life stage.

My own children were in the room, participating in the meeting, so we got to hear firsthand their perspective on some of the favorite traditions we're practicing now. What I discovered is that "it's working." We have long desired to capitalize on our children's love of holidays and special occasions and celebrations, and to use them to underscore the special significance of certain spiritual truths. We've always wanted Christmas to be more about Jesus than Santa. We've wanted them to be firmly grounded in truth. We've wanted them to be more excited about giving than receiving. And we've wanted to avoid the materialistic spending frenzy that is typical of Christmas in America.

Yeah, right. Pretty tall order. But we've done our best, and it seems to be mostly working. Here are some of the things we do toward that end... all of them are not "spiritual," and some of them have just "come about on their own" without any planning or thought or purpose to it. Some of them are just silly and fun, while some of them are deeply significant. Some we hold lightly; some we simply must do.

So, although I'm pretty sure nobody else is as excited to read all about our family's Christmas traditions as I am to write them all down, here they are, in no particular order:

* We usually stay away from anything Christmas-y until after Thanksgiving, in order to give that holiday its own importance and focus. On Thanksgiving day, after all the feasting, we always watch "It's a Wonderful Life." It is just a great movie that underscores what's really important and what really isn't... and my husband is pretty much George Bailey. (2014 note: This year was the first year in all of my married life that I didn't watch this movie on Thanksgiving Day. Seriously. Thank you, pre-Black Friday shopping on Thanksgiving Day. Grrrr!)

* By far our most important and significant tradition is doing our "Advent banner," beginning on December 1. Iivo and I created this banner (from the book Family Celebrations - Meeting Christ in Your Holidays and Special Occasions by Ann Hibbard) when I was pregnant with EV, and we've been going through these family devotions during Advent ever since. We made a banner with a large flannel Christmas tree, and each "ornament" (with its symbolic felt emblem) is velcroed onto the tree by a child after the Advent meditation has been completed each evening. This keeps our focus clearly on the spiritual dimensions and implications of the Advent season. Our regular family devotions are replaced with this Advent banner during this time. [2013 note: These devotions are perfect for little ones, and a little "babyish" for older ones, but we walk through them every year anyway. We've added an Advent "road to the manger" candle tradition—compliments of Ann Voskamp's son, who handcrafts them himself, with all profits going to missions. We printed the pictures and made the "ornaments" for her advent tree devotional several years ago, and we usually do some of that, too, when we can. We reprise the "thankfulness tree" from Thanksgiving, and we hang that beautiful artwork on it. Sometimes, now that they're older, we'll do three or four days' worth of felt banner devotions at a time, and other nights we won't do it at all. Whatever works to keep all the relevant Advent scriptures before our eyes and minds throughout the month.]

* We also have collected quite a set of Christmas books over the years, so our evening "family read-aloud" is also disbanded during this time, and we read a Christmas story together each night. These range from the explanatory (Santa, Are You For Real?) to the symbolically spiritual (this year's acquisition—The Tale of Three Trees) to the silly and fun (A Wish for Wings that Work - an Opus Christmas Story). We have enough by now to last us throughout the Christmas season. The red-white-and-green basket of books comes out with the Christmas decorations and sits out all month, by the couch; the kids tend to pick up and read the books on their own throughout the month, as well.

* However soon as is practical after Thanksgiving, we head together as a family to get our Christmas tree. Though there is a lovely(?) artificial tree in our attic even as I type, over the past few years we have developed the habit of heading to our local Taylor's for a "real" tree, which as of this 2008 writing can be had for only $14.99. Somehow it has come to be tradition that after we choose our tree and strap it to the van, we head across the street to eat at the Tijuana Flat's restaurant that is there. There is nothing Christmas-y about it, but it is pretty expensive for our whole family to go there, so we usually only do it this one time during the year. It has become part of the Christmas traditions purely by accident. [2013 note: The "must have a real tree" thing has continued, through several price hikes at Taylor's over the years and then the eventual abandonment of that store entirely after this tree fiasco. Also, the super-close Tijuana Flats closed down, so we now head across town to the other one, though it is nowhere near the purchasing place of the Christmas tree anymore!]

* We usually end up putting only the lights on the tree at this point, and then "do the ornament thing" about a week later. While the lights go up, we tend to gravitate toward a favorite Christmas CD called It's Christmas Time, with carols and fun Christmas songs sung by Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, and Frank Sinatra.

* After the lights are on the tree, the girls usually grab the other Christmas decorations from the attic and scatter them about the house, while iivo and PT put some Christmas lights outside, on the house and bushes.

* We have a variety of nativity sets, and they go up in different rooms of the house... right down to the little clear glass ones EL bought at the Dollar Tree for her sister OG and her brother PT one year when she was very little, "so they can have one of their own like EV." (The "nativity of her own" for EV came from her Sunday school teacher when she was a preschooler, and is a little nativity set of black figures. She still puts it up in her room every year.)

* Iivo's birthday falls in the middle of the "Christmas season," so there is usually a break somewhere in here one weekend to celebrate him and his birth.

* "Doing the ornament thing" is an experience around our house, and it is usually reserved for a weekend of its own after Iivo's birthday weekend. (We're still homeschooling during these weeks of early December, so weekends are all we have!) Each ornament is brought out and—since many of them have significant memories attached to them—discussed as it is put on the tree. My mother has been buying a different Christmas tree ornament for each of my children every Christmas since they were born, so that they'll have a set of ornaments to take with them to their own homes when they leave ours. They each pull a few of their own ornaments out of their ever-growing collection of special storage boxes, smiling and remembering and deciding where to place each one. It is usually best if I stay out of this process as much as possible. (See here for more about this!)

* When we put ornaments on the tree, we listen to A Charlie Brown Christmas by the Vince Guaraldi Trio. This is relatively calm and mostly instrumental, which helps during the frenzy. So does egg nog, by the way, so that's become typical during the ornament-hanging as well.

* Though we own a lot of Christmas albums, and have put them all into a Christmas playlist on the iPods, a few favorites tend to come out and stay front and center around our house in December. These include the two already mentioned, James Taylor's James Taylor at Christmas, Christmas Portrait by the Carpenters, and A Christmas Together by John Denver and the Muppets. A local radio station plays Christmas music all season, and it tends to irritate some of us and thrill others of us. So there is usually some listening to "I'm Gettin' Nuttin' for Christmas" or "Feed the World" or "Santa Baby" type songs... and the commensurate "radio wars" that go on when one member of the family doesn't want to hear "Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime" for the eight-hundredth time, while one other member of the family has every radio station in the house tuned to this station—and turned on!

* Our children do not have "Christmas wish lists," and we tend to buy each of them only one "big" present each Christmas. This item is something we think they would enjoy having, not something they've asked for. (I think both our homeschooling and our not watching television have helped in this regard, because there aren't nearly as many "have to have this" items in a kid's mind when he isn't in the peer-conformity world of school or watching TV commercials telling him how much he needs a specific thing.) They never ask for particular things they want, as we've never fostered an environment that caters to that. They do have grandparents, however, who will sometimes ask if there are any particular wishes; occasionally one surfaces, but not usually.

* What they do love (and I mean love) is the practice we have of going out shopping—one child at a time, with me—to buy a specific gift for each of their siblings. (I talked about this in my last post.) They plan out and think about what they might like to buy each other, sometimes for weeks and months before Christmas, and head out once we finish homeschooling—with either a very specific plan in mind, or with an open mind combined with a pretty good knowledge of the sibling—and we shop. This is both exhausting and exhilarating to me. Truth be told, I love it, too! There is something thrilling about seeing your children genuinely more excited about the gifts they're giving than the ones they're receiving. (2014 note: Although I still LOVE watching them give each other perfect gifts that demonstrate how well they know each other, I've had to let go of the joy of helping them pick them out and getting to shop with them. They've all been old enough to get each others' gifts without me for a while now! Every once in a while a non-driver will ask for a ride, and I'll secretly smile inside at this throwback to the good old days!)

* The actual celebrating really begins for us on "Christmas Adam." (You know... the night before Christmas Eve! This nickname was given to December 23 one year by one of my children—I don't know which one started it, honestly—and it has stuck ever since.) This night, for us, usually involves opening a single present... the huge box—all individually wrapped inside but also wrapped together in one big box—of our new Christmas PJs. I wish I'd taken pictures of everyone in them, every year, to watch the growth of the kids and to save the memories... but we didn't, so we just have to remember in our brains. Even as I type right now, I'm wearing the "Downton Abbey-style" PJs we selected in 2013—all warm flannel with buttons and collars, and oh-so-comfy.

* Christmas Eve, for us, traditionally involves a series of Christmas Eve church services. There is a children's service at my parents' church up the road that starts at 4:00 and involves story-telling and craft-making and a "birthday cake" for Jesus. My parents pick up and take the little ones to that, while the older ones and we adults get ready for our church's service. Iivo is the worship leader, and usually some of the rest of us are involved in the music in some way, too. That service is typically at 5:30. My father brings the little girls after the children's service is over, and then attends that 5:30 service with us. My mother is usually doing some last minute rehearsing at her church for the 7:00 service there. Once our service is over, we try to limit the intake of Christmas cookies by our children, then head up the road to that service to see Nanny sing in the choir and ring the hand bells. By the time this service is over, we are all "sung out" and starving, and we head up the road to the local Chinese restaurant and share a variety of dishes, served "family style." Afterward we head back to my parents' house for more Christmas cookies and hot apple cider, and to open stockings.

* [If my family has traveled out of town to TN for Christmas, or if Iivo's family is visiting from out of town, this pattern tends to look a little different. We only attend our Christmas Eve service, and afterward we eat a meal highlighting a blending of traditional Estonian and Swiss foods. This would typically be a pork roast, sauerkraut and red cabbage (very Swiss-German!), rosolje (Estonian "purple potato salad" containing pickles and beets and—if you're lucky—skipping the herring!), sai (an Estonian Christmas bread made with raisins), and verivorst (Estonian Christmas sausage). If my mother-in-law has cooked and brought some verivorst, the Eesti folk eat this—and Iivo loves it—but the rest of us tend to pass on the blood sausage. If my in-laws are here, we'll stay home and open our own stockings on Christmas Eve, with my parents joining us here for egg nog or cider or Christmas cookies.]

* Once the kids are in bed, we go around and swipe all the baby Jesus figures from each nativity set and carefully wrap them together in one package. We wrap this package very plain and dull and place it under the tree. (This becomes "the first gift of Christmas" in the morning, and we highlight the fact that Jesus—the greatest gift ever given—arrived here without fanfare or recognizable earthly glory.)

* On Christmas morning, Iivo and I get up early and put in the dough for the traditional cinnamon rolls that are our Christmas breakfast. Afterward, we crawl back into bed and "sleep in" as late as the first child. This child—however big or small—crawls into bed with us and waits for brother or sisters to awaken and join us. Once three of the four are up, we decide it is time for the final child to get up, and all head in together to rouse the sleepyhead.

*We get up and get going in the morning with the final installment of the Advent banner. This is meant to be the Christmas Eve lesson, but we wisely skip this since we've usually already attended two church services that night. This lesson is on the wise men, and segues nicely into the first gift of Christmas. We open this (the baby Jesus figures wrapped the night before) and the children go put each baby Jesus back with the corresponding nativity set. This was more naturally "fun" when they were little, but it has become part of what we do, so even these older children love to walk through this process.

* After this, we head into the kitchen, fashion the dough into cinnamon rolls, and get them going in the oven. While we wait for them to bake, we open our stockings.

* For breakfast, we have cinnamon rolls and either sausage or hard-boiled eggs for protein so no one "melts down." After we eat this, the kids are finally able to head in and distribute their gifts to their siblings. They are fairly about to burst with anticipation by this point, but they take turns and go one at a time. One child "plays Santa" first, and gives her gifts to her siblings one at a time. Said sibling opens the gift and we all enjoy seeing what was given and received. This process takes a while, since there are twelve gifts (three each) that have been purchased by the children for each other. It always strikes me every year how fun it is to "know" and "be known," as these gifts perfectly reflect their knowledge of each other and what each other likes and might enjoy receiving.

* After this, we take a break to read a Christmas storybook, then give the children the presents we have bought for them. Iivo and I don't buy each other any gifts (his birthday is in early December and mine is in early January), but instead buy one "big thing" we feel the family needs or would enjoy. This can range from the immensely practical and needed to the totally frivolous and decidedly un-needed. Everybody usually knows about what this gift might be, as there's been some discussion about it throughout the preceding months. It is revealed at some point over the course of the morning.

* At some point several years ago (2011, maybe?) we started a tradition of eliminating each child's "big gift" and replacing it with $100ish dollars' worth of credit toward a World Vision or Show Hope gift that they select and give, using the money that would have gone to their "big gift." (If you didn't click on those links, you really should. Or at least click here and take 90 seconds to see how it works. We love giving gifts that make a difference in the world all year long!) They still receive a small gift or two from us, but now more than ever, Christmas is, for them, about what they get to give, not what they are going to get... both to each other, through the gifts they buy each other, and through the gifts they choose for the needy around the world. They choose, and we order, these gifts on Christmas morning. (Cards of thanksgiving for the donations arrive in the mail sometime during the ensuing 12 Days of Christmas we're celebrating around here.)

* After all this, my parents—if they've joined us—head back home, we shower and get ready, and then we all re-convene at their house for a holiday meal mid-afternoon. The menu used to vary a bit every year (usually some variation of turkey or ham, with each of us contributing different side dishes to go with it), but over the years it's settled into ham, Nanny's warm potato salad, Nanny's cranberry salad, fresh green beans, and Laura rolls. When we gather at their house, we eat the feast, and then open the gifts from them.

* Over the course of the month, we tend to watch a Christmas movie or two. These vary from year to year, and have included such favorites as Miracle on 34th Street, Elf, The Santa Clause, Samantha (An American Girl Tale for Christmas), Prancer, and The Polar Express. We also usually try to fit in a viewing or two from among the favorite childhood television specials we always watched when they (and we!) were little:  How the Grinch Stole Christmas; A Charlie Brown Christmas; Frosty the Snowman; Rudolph; or Nestor, the Long-Eared Donkey (my personal favorite since I was a girl). As the kids have gotten older, this list has expanded to include many hardly-seems-right-to-call-them-Christmas-movies-just-because-Christmas-is-in-them films that we've enjoyed with our teen children. (Think Die Hard or While You Were Sleeping here!)

* We have watched The Nativity Story every year since we went to see it in the theater with my sister and her family, who were visiting, the year it came out, but we have yet to figure out a "regular" time to do it, so the tradition is simply that we must do so some time over the course of the season.

* If Iivo's family hasn't come to visit us, there is usually some holiday travel involved after Christmas to go see them. This may be the weekend after Christmas, or over New Year's, but sometime over the course of the break we try to get to see them, too.

* Although the Christmas decorations disappear from my mother's house as quickly as the local radio station playing Christmas songs reverts back to its usual love-song format, we tend to leave the decorations up through all of the "twelve days of Christmas." We're just not quite ready to see them go by December 26th, and so we leave them up until a weekend falling somewhere around January 5.

* Unfortunately, it is usually not until this stage of things that I get around to doing our Christmas cards! We are terrible about Christmas cards, but I love them!! I love sending them, and I love getting them, even if they do arrive later than everyone else's! (See here for more on this!)

"The aroma of our homes is created by the liturgy of our lives. The liturgy of our lives, simply put, is what happens when we deliberately think through what we do and why... There is liturgy in all of our lives. We all have family traditions that in many ways tell the stories of our homes and what we value."
- Steve Murphy, publisher of Homeschooling Today magazine

What is it we value at Christmas time? First and foremost, we value the Savior. We long to keep Him first and foremost in our minds as we walk through the season that follows Thanksgiving and incorporates New Year's. What began as a celebration of the incarnation—God made man and delivered to us as a baby—has become deliberately secularized in American culture. It has become more about Santa and getting stuff than about Jesus and giving stuff. It has become more about "happy holidays" than "Merry Christmas." It has become a spending frenzy that breaks many families' budgets and creates many spoiled, ungrateful, never-quite-happy-enough children. We work hard to reverse that focus in our home. Jesus is squarely the central focus for us.

We also value the fun and the feasting and the break from the routine that this season offers. It is a chance to break out of the daily grind and to reflect on what is important to us in new, fresh ways. We value our immediate family, and we love remembering them with special little tokens of affection. We value our extended family, and we treasure the chance to visit with them in whatever ways work out each year. We value the special friends we have, and we enjoy spending time with whichever ones He's given us to be particularly close to in each of the various seasons of our lives.

Even talking about it all has made me nostalgic and anticipatory. We will walk through many of these traditions again this year... this week... and over Christmas Eve... and Christmas Day... and New Year's Eve... and New Year's Day. I really can't wait!

Your Name Is an L Word

I love the exercise of writing poetry to a prompt. It stretches me as a writer to have to work within someone else's confines. This month's writing prompt at Poets Online was as challenging as it was interesting: write a poem about sex, using tweet-like stanzas of fewer than 140 characters. That's it. 

So, with a blush and a sigh, I offer you this month's post. 

Your Name Is an L Word

I really, really didn't know what I was doing, all those years and all those climaxes ago. Never mind the virginity. It was intentional.

Yes. I had decided to bottle all of it and save it for you. Every last drop. Every once in a while, we uncorked it and tasted a little.

Scary how it almost consumed us, those few little drops. It was sweet and savage and I knew it would be the death of me. In the best way,

like she said as she sang about the dark and wonderful unknown. It *was* wonderful, this unknown passion that threatened to undo me

and send me careening. There came that point that the wine tastings of the future glory were too much for me. Drunk on you. Drunk

on the need. The craving that was most certainly going to eat me alive--or at least my resolve--was staring me down. I wanted it to win so bad

I could taste it... but I corked it back up and I made it wait. Starved it for a while, to make it hungrier and hungrier.

They called it old-fashioned, and truly it was, for who waits for this sacred moment anymore? I felt it in my throat. The longing. I felt it

in my gut, the aching need. I became aware of words like "loins" because I needed a word for it. Such a good Bible word

for the good Bible girl. Longing and loins and lovers. Luscious L words.

Lingering. All the waiting had made you patient. When the day finally came and the dam finally broke, you were ready

to wait a little bit longer. Just long enough to play skillfully and work wonders, without any training save a book and a song. We learned

together, those many romps ago. Your fingers worked me like they do that guitar, and I could barely breathe from the desperate hunger of it

all. Craving. One flesh. I consumed you, and you filled me, and it was unspeakably worth the wait. Every. Single. Time.

Who knew it could be new every time, and that every time would be my favorite? The years are swirling, and the taut flesh is aging,

and the guitar fingers ache a little in the morning. But you're still the best thing I ever tasted, and I'm still so glad it's been you.

Only you.

© 2014 Laurie Sitterding

Listen to Ingrid Michaelaon's "Wonderful Unknown"

There is beauty, beauty everywhere

Taking a page out of Mark Rodriguez's play book and looking for beauty everywhere, my daughter OG grabbed my iPhone camera and snapped these shots on the way out of Home Depot, of all places.

Mark's thoughts, shared from his personal journal by his mother on God Is Super Good, are really encouraging me in my walk with God.

Despite his youth, Mark had a strong faith and an exemplary devotional life. This is journal-writing at its best!

It really does seem that Mark lived life with one foot here and one foot already in heaven. I, too, want to see beauty everywhere, and to give God glory for all of it.

*Entry 8, August - The 12 Months of 2014 Blog Challenge
The title is a line from the song "Beauty" from Starship--The Musical.

We Had Seasons in the Sun

As I read this post from Shauna Niequist this morning, I was filled with nostalgia and family memories of summers gone by on the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  We don't have our own little island, and our memories don't house conch fritters and row-boat rides, but I loved reading about her precious times with her family, and the million little memories that have stacked onto one another over their years of visiting the same place, together.

Ever since my parents scraped together the funds to buy a piece of heaven-on-earth when I was in high school, we've been able to stack memories, one on top of the other, of yearly summer weeks spent together.  And Memorial Day.  Labor Day.  Cold winter weekends to get away during the off-season--just you and some folks you love sharing nothing in particular, but doing it together.  Retreats for church women--that much-needed get-away for harried young mothers, afforded only because of the generosity of my folks.  I doubt they knew all they were providing when they made that purchase all those years ago.  My family has precious memories I could never have afforded to provide--not even once, let alone year after year--because of the generous provision of two parents who gathered the generations by the seashore every summer.

Thank you, Mom and Dad, for providing us with this blessing for all the years of our married life!  Our family trips to the NC shore are precious to me.  I'm full of precious memories with precious people over many precious, fleeting years.

From quiet, carefree, joy-filled days getting to know each other as husband and wife... to a tiny newborn sleeping in a drawer... setting up sun tents for sandy, sleeping infants (who no doubt have sand clutched in their teeny fists)... fits thrown at bedtime, or when it's time to get out of the hot tub... little cloth sun hats that cover tiny heads and necks, and shade little pudgy cheeks...  toys and games in the owners' closet, like old friends who meet us for a once-a-year visit...

Fresh fruit and veggies from Powell's on the way in... little pink, sunburned cheeks... meltdowns on the back nine as we play putt-putt past bedtime... sandcastles... working on puzzles together in the hot room with the ice machine... little girls fighting over who has to sleep on the trundle bed... MuMama's blue beach chair... Tripoly... making t-shirts together at that cool clothing shop... stopping for BBQ buffets... looking for shells and sea glass in the cool of the early morning...

Stepping on Pooh guys by the upstairs wood table... fireworks on the beach... chasing sand crabs in the dusky twilight... five little girls always pairing up to leave someone "out"... that bouncy, green cart with yellow wheels, full of shovels and buckets and coolers and all manner of fun... the respite of shade under a colorful umbrella... Rummikub... watching the neighbors' illegal firecrackers catch the dried sea grass on fire--and having to call the fire department!... Cabin Boy... bike rides to the pool... a buried body with a sandy mermaid's tail... honey buns for breakfast... Yahtzee... boursin... spying on feral cats from the balcony...


Lazy naps in a hammock... having to take turns with boogie boards and skim boards and huge, floating rings... offering your great-grandmother an arm on the walk to the ocean... knowing your great-grandmother--and I mean, really knowing her...

Taking refuge in a dark theater on yet another rainy day... Lighthouse bagels... late-night neighbor-partying keeping everyone awake... little fits and tears over sunscreen in little eyes... swinging on the swing set by the community pool... sunburned ears or feet because someone forgot about coating them... "Ssssh!  Aunt Nita's still asleep on the couch!"... early morning walks through Pine Island...

 
Looking for a bargain at the "all merchandise 50% off" spots... adding whatever is needed to the community grocery list... baths in Nanny's big, jetted tub... "reapply!"... dear dogs running on the beach, which may just be what doggie heaven is like now for Huckie and Zach and Little and Winston... guitars and fiddles and ukeleles...

Skinned elbows and knees from bike-time wipeouts... a huge lazy Susan... a row of bikes heading to the grocery store or to get Duck Donuts... Nita's spaghetti, and Nanny's pound cake, and MuMama's banana pudding: the tastes of beach week... "and now we're having fun writing songs with the fam..."

"There will be a day when memories will be all we have," said Shauna Niequist.  Tears spring to my eyes as I consider how true this is.  I think of many people I have loved, those I can now only meet in my memory.  I know the time is short... with our parents, one of whom is already passed from this life to the next.  With our children, one of whom is already pledged to another, beginning to dream about what life will look like when "home" isn't the same place as my own four walls.  I cry for my pastor, whose son was unexpectedly snatched from them a month ago by a gunman's stray bullet.  I cry for my sweet friend Jeanine, who entered her final rest from her courageous battle with cancer just 36 hours ago.  I cry for their family members and friends, who now visit with those they love only in memories.  The time given us is short, and life is fleeting, and in a matter of moments we have to say goodbye... whether we were ready to or not.

I am driven to a desire to live each moment to the fullest--in connection--and to never waste another precious moment of life fighting or arguing or taking those I love for granted!  I am driven to a desire to capture memories better than I do--more pictures, more videos, more snapshots of daily-day life with those precious ones who live in my circle, at least for this day.  I am driven to a Savior, who comforts my pain--and that of my friends--and who has made a way of lasting comfort and joy for me: that I may know Him in this life, and that I may know Him--and my loved ones who also know Him--forever in the life to come.  "Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent" - John 17:3.

"Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever" - Psalm 23:6.  And until that day, may I live life deliberately, like one who is "stealing against the inevitability of time," and loving every minute of it I'm given.  Thank you, Shauna, for the reminder!

*Entry 7, July - The 12 Months of 2014 Blog Challenge
The title is a line from the song "Seasons in the Sun," recorded by Terry Jacks, and then by the Beach Boys, and then covered by many others.  It is an adaptation of Rod McKuen's lyric poem, which is itself an English translation of a French one, "Le Moribond."

...'til he takes up the pen and writes

I am a teacher, and one of the great privileges of my life is teaching young writers to express themselves better on paper.  I am deeply humbled by this privilege, for I know that there are far better writers out there than me, and I know that all of us can be better writers than we are.  However, watching a few of my students wake up to their potential and to the glory of taking one's thoughts to the keyboard or the pen and capturing them... refining them... perfecting them to communicate just what you want them to... It is glorious work indeed.

Very soon their "writer's notebooks," which they've used every week for this school year to practice the art of writing well--whether writing descriptively, writing in different points of view, or writing using different tenses--will shift from being solely places of "assigned writing" and "writing prompts" and will move into being the writing of journals.  They will be forced, by assignment, to write a first-person journal entry to the Lord.  They will be forced to capture their daily thoughts and feelings in love letters to God.

My goal, of course, is that this forced habit will be continued long after our class is over, just like the daily reading for pleasure, and the Scripture memory, and the blogging, and the writing and memorizing and reading of poetry...  My prayer for them is that they will be blessed daily by all these things, and by communion with the Lord through written journal writing.  Whether that comes to pass, of course, remains with them!

"There are thousands of thoughts lying within a man that he does not know 'til he takes up the pen and writes." - William Makepeace Thackery

 *Entry 3, March - The 12 Months of 2014 Blog Challenge

Conception to Birth

Alexander Tsiaras, one-time associate professor of medicine and chief of scientific visualization at Yale University, discusses things inside the human body--now able to be seen and observed with new imaging and scanning technology--that it has never been possible to see before.

He observes that they "allowed us to see things about the body that just made you marvel... (things) so perfectly organized and structured that it made it hard not to attribute divinity to it, because we kept on seeing this over and over again in different parts of the body."

An excerpt from the video piece From Conception to Birth: a Life Unfolds is included in the middle of the interview.



As Alexander Tsiaras explains, "The complexity of these--the mathematical models of how these things are indeed done--are beyond human comprehension... beyond any comprehension of any existing mathematics today.. and even though I am a mathematician, I look at these with the marvel of, 'How do these instruction sets not make these mistakes as they build what is us?'  It's a mystery.  It's magic.  It's divinity." 

"For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well."    -- Psalm 139:13-14

The heavens declare the glory of God!

Can you imagine waking up to this view every morning?

Me, neither, but my dear friend Tim sends out a lovely daily Scripture verse (beautiful words!) accompanied by whatever pictures he took that day on his morning walk.

Can you imagine this as your daily morning walk?!

 

¹ The heavens declare the glory of God;
    the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
² Day after day they pour forth speech;
    night after night they reveal knowledge.
³ They have no speech, they use no words;
    no sound is heard from them.
⁴ Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,
    their words to the ends of the world.
    In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
⁵  It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
    like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
⁶ It rises at one end of the heavens
    and makes its circuit to the other;
    nothing is deprived of its warmth.

Psalm 19:1-6 (NIV)

"A word fitly spoken..."

I'm here at the local Chick-fil-A restaurant, waiting to pick up one of my children.  I'm struck by how lovely this particular fast food place is.  When I ordered my food, the cute young woman behind the counter asked, "How may I serve you?"

(How often do I think in terms of serving?)

How often does the average teen employee think in terms of serving?!

She offered to to have the food sent to my table.  When it was, and I thanked the young man who brought it, he happily responded with, "My pleasure!"

And you know what?  I believed him.  Not because he is forced to say that phrase--which I know for a fact that he is--but because I believe his heart attitude has been changed, just a little bit, by having been forced to say that phrase.

Every workday.  For several hours. 

"How may I serve you?"

"My pleasure."

I believe this sort of thing changes a person.  There is power in our words...power to change our heart attitudes.  "A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver," (Proverbs 25:11, KJV).

Or maybe it could just as easily have said, "...is like a vase of real flowers on the table of a fast food restaurant."  So lovely... in every way!

 

An epiphany on Epiphany

Well, the 12-Days-of-Christmas Blog Challenge is officially over, and this is the 13th Day of Christmas 2012. Maybe. Depending how you calculate it.  Some people--and "official" ones at that--claim that The Twelve Days of Christmas begin on Christmas Day, December 25, and culminate on Twelfth Night, the Eve of Epiphany.  Other "official" folks claim that they really begin the day after Christmas, culminating on the actual January 6 holiday of Epiphany.

And it turns out, actually, that even the date for Epiphany itself is negotiable. Most traditions seem to place it always on January 6, but others insist that it should be on a Sunday and therefore commemorate Epiphany on whatever Sunday falls between December 2 and December 8.  Unless they feel like doing it the Sunday before--apparently, that's okay, too.

This reminds me a little of Easter; I can never keep track of what the "rule" is for determining which Sunday it will be in any given year!

It also reminds me of our dear friends from Germany, the Erharts, who lived here in the States as our neighbors several years ago. They enjoyed the traditional Thanksgiving meal with our family on Thanksgiving Day the last year they were here. We also celebrated a "Summertime Thanksgiving of sorts" during their last month here, in which we cooked and ate the whole blessed feast again when it was 95 degrees outside! It wasn't until the following year--when they were back in Germany and we were here eating the American feast again--that we realized the confusion over dates. They sent a lovely email on Friday--the day after Thanksgiving--telling us they were thinking of us as we celebrated. It didn't take us long to figure out that they thought the holiday fell on the particular date and not a particular day. (Again, what's the rule for knowing which Thursday it will be? Is it the last one in November? The fourth one? Is the fourth Thursday always the last Thursday?) But I digress...

Back to the point. (Is there a point?!) In my book, today, January 6, is the 13th Day of Christmas and the day to celebrate Epiphany, if you do that sort of thing.  However, it is kind of hard to make much of Epiphany when the people out there who sometimes force your hand with regard to your schedule (think school and work here!) have sent you back to your duties. 

We always leave our Christmas decorations up through Epiphany, though we stop burning the outside lights afterwards if it falls early in the week, to wait for a convenient weekend time to take them down without becoming "those neighbors"!

In the absence of any great ideas that have worked their way into our holiday traditions at Epiphany--feel free to share if you have any meaningful practices up your sleeve!--I always use this opportunity to teach my Creative Writing students [and to remind my own children, as we are homeschoolers, after all!] about the differences in the various meanings of the word "epiphany."  So, first things first:

* Epiphany (with a capital E) refers to the holiday, which is defined for us by About.com's Guide to Christianity Mary Fairchild as follows:

Epiphany, also known as "Three Kings Day" and "Twelfth Day," is a Christian holiday commemorated on January 6. It falls on the twelfth day after Christmas, and for some denominations signals the conclusion of the twelve days of the Christmas season. Though many different cultural and denominational customs are practiced, in general, the feast celebrates the manifestation of God in the form of human flesh through Jesus Christ, his Son.

The word epiphany means “manifestation” or “revelation" and is commonly linked in Western Christianity with the visit of the wise men (Magi) to the Christ child. Through the Magi, Christ revealed himself to the gentiles. In Eastern Christianity, Epiphany puts emphasis on the baptism of Jesus by John, with Christ revealing himself to the world as God's own Son. Likewise, on Epiphany some denominations commemorate Jesus' miracle of turning water into wine, signifying the manifestation of Christ's divinity as well.

(Notice that even she acknowledges the squirrelly nature of trying to pin down a date for the thing!)

* Colloquially, the word *epiphany*refers to "a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience." (This definition is provided to us by Dictionary.com.) 

"In other words," my students always tell me, "an epiphany is an *aha moment*!"  Well, yeah, pretty much.

* Literarily, the word *epiphany* is "a literary work or section of a work presenting, usually symbolically, such a moment of revelation and insight."

I love teaching about epiphany. I love those little commonplace moments--whether in literature or in life--that change us. That make us realize something extraordinary in the midst of the oh-so-ordinary. That, in some ways, define us.

And so I will end with an epiphany-of-sorts that I am in the middle of... that I'm just now starting to realize, as I see the profound truth that I am so prone to miss...

This particular musing has been brought on by Theodore Roosevelt, through the following quotation from his book, An Autobiography, published in 1913.

"For unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go reasonably well, certainly makes all other forms of success and achievement lose their importance by comparison."

May I ever remember it...and seek to love and enjoy and not miss these wonderful ones living with us for just so-very-few-more years more! All other forms of success and achievement do lose their importance by comparison! 

We see Him come, and know Him ours...

Enjoying this beautiful music... pondering the deep realities clothed in His coming...

What sweeter music can we bring
Than a carol, for to sing
The birth of this our heavenly King?
Awake the voice! Awake the string!

Dark and dull night, fly hence away,
And give the honor to this day,
That sees December turned to May.

Why does the chilling winter’s morn
Smile, like a field beset with corn?
Or smell like a meadow newly-shorn,
Thus, on the sudden? Come and see
The cause, why things thus fragrant be:
‘Tis He is born, whose quickening birth
Gives life and luster, public mirth,
To heaven, and the under-earth.

We see him come, and know him ours,
Who, with his sunshine and his showers,
Turns all the patient ground to flowers.

The darling of the world is come,
And fit it is, we find a room
To welcome him. The nobler part
Of all the house here, is the heart.
Which we will give him; and bequeath
This holly, and this ivy wreath,
To do him honour, who’s our King,
And Lord of all this revelling.

What sweeter music can we bring,
Than a carol for to sing
The birth of this our heavenly King?
- Robert Herrick (1591-1674)

I have not known this song until yesterday, and I have deeply appreciated pondering it... studying it, like I would a poem. So many things strike me, but predominantly this, today, on the first pass: "We know Him come, and see Him ours, Who, with His sunshine and His showers, turns all the patient ground to flowers..."

Oh, the sweet truth that my sovereign Lord is come, and is mine! And that He promises to work all things in my life--both sunshine and showers--together for good! Oh, sweet joy. Quiet trust.

May I rest as willingly and well as that patient ground, confident of the coming flowers...

Tidings of Comfort and Joy

I'm not cheating! I'm just getting a "practice day" head start or two on my friend Pam's December Blog Challenge.

I've been more than a bit absent from the blogosphere lately, and, though I could blame it on the intestinal flu our family has been passing around, it would be a lie.

I am sitting at my in-laws' house in NC...the delicious smells of pork roast and verivorst--Estonian Christmas sausage--wafting through the house...listening to the achingly beautiful strains of Pandora Radio's "instrumental holiday" station...

Life really is so unbelievably rich and wonderful, and I am so sinfully, defiantly ungrateful when I stew around in impatience... Indignance... grumpiness... ingratitude. May I remember every moment of every day those good "tidings of comfort and joy" that changed absolutely everything! What have I to grumble and fret about when the Lord of all has rescued and redeemed me and walks with me in sweet fellowship and the promise of unending faithfulness.

“It is a good thing to let prayer be the first business of the morning and the last at night.” - Martin Luther

I'm trying, Lord. Oh, I'm trying.

To refocus. To slow down. To reflect and ponder all the many, many blessings that are mine everyday. Ordinary miracles.

The drop in temperature at the eventide.

The happy chatter of birds high in the trees.

Breathing deeply of fresh summer air.

A leisurely bike ride to retrieve a little one from Grampa's house.

Guests who leave my table stuffed and happy.

The wonder in a young boy's eyes as he rolls out his first homemade bread dough.

New neighbors who call on the name of the Lord.

Finding raw milk cheese.

The surprise delight of peach nectar in my fridge.

Bedtime.

Creation Calls

Swan Lake

Now granted, I recognize that I am still technically "post-partum," having experienced the hormonal plunge of a sudden end to pregnancy... and so, this might not be as moving as it somehow seemed to me when I watched it today.  Sometimes I'm a sap, and as such, this kind of marriage of beauty and accomplishment can cause tears to spring to my eyes.

These dancers are so smooth and graceful and polished that it seems flawless and natural, even as her body is put into positions that would in other contexts seem almost contortionist.  My favorite part is toward the end, when the extra male dancer comes out and almost imperceptibly shadows the pair as the ballerina does pointe on the danseur's head.  This spotter's entry and exit are barely discernible; he is just there, as extra safety during such an extraordinary feat of dancing skill.

Somehow, indirectly, vicariously almost, I felt honored and cared for as a woman as I watched that demonstration of concern for her safety, even as she perfectly executed the moves and proved his presence unnecessary.  Bravo!