A Survivor Speaks

" We know that every moment is a moment of grace, every hour an offering; not to share them would mean to betray them.
Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us desperately."

Elie Wiesel
Holocaust survivor and winner of the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize
"one who has emerged from the Kingdom of Night"

Warthogs or Girls?

My four-year-old was taking a survey of his own design this morning.
He started with his big brother. Pointing to his crude drawing of a face with two eyes and long hair, and a face with hair and a pig snout, he asked, pen poised,
"Do you like warthogs or girls?"
After a time of brief reflection, Timothy stated, "Girls."
Benjamin made the appropriate notes and said,
" I like girls too, because I don't want to be snuffed by a warthog."

A True Friend

One need not polish self or circumstance nor diminish joy or accomplishments in order to share with a true friend. True friendship is being truly present with one another through life as we find it. Not feeling the need to edit ones comments beforehand nor analyze them afterwards. A free-flowing exchange and mutual understanding.
A plaque given to me by one such friend reads,
"A true friend warms you with her presence, trusts you with her secrets, and remembers you in her prayers."

What's My Name when I'm in trouble?

"Mommy, what's my name when I'm in trouble?", Benjamin wants to know. I'm unsure what he is getting at, but he restates the question. I assure him that he is not in trouble, and that his name is always the same, and that it's a wonderful name. Then he answers his own question, "Why do you call me Benjamin Luke when I am in trouble?" There it is. I've joined the throngs of parents who utilize the middle name for emphasis in a behavorial crisis. I'll try to vary my approach a little, so he doesn't come to fear hearing his full name - or maybe I'll need the extra clout with him.

Adam Bede on Sorrow

Last night a woman of God from India shared about suffering with a small group of women from our church. She spoke of God's ability to transform us in times of suffering, and His redemption of any scenario we encounter in life.
Here is a quote on suffering from the novel Adam Bede, by one of my favorite authors, George Eliot. Adam Bede had discovered that the woman he had given his heart to and hoped to marry had loved another man, been deserted by him, had his child and was condemned to die for abandoning the child. This passage speaks of how the tragedy transformed him, and how his anguish was unwasted.

For Adam, though you see him quite master of himself, working hard and
delighting in his work after his inborn inalienable nature, had not outlived his
sorrow - had not felt it slip from him as a temporary burden, and leave him the
same man again.

Do any of us? God forbid. It would be a poor result of all our anguish and
our wrestling, if we won nothing but our old selves at the end of it - if we
could return to the same blind loves, the same self-confident blame, the same
light thoughts of human suffering, the same frivolous gossip over blighted human
lives, the same feeble sense of the Unknown towards which we have sent forth
irrepressible cries in our loneliness.

Let us rather be thankful that our sorrow lives in us as an indestructible force, only changing its form, as forces do, and passing from
pain into sympathy - the one poor word which includes all our best insight and
our best love.

Mud and Rainbows

Most rainbows come with some form of mud. The pride and amazement of watching your youngest clamber up the steps of the school bus with his big brother and sister, coupled with a sense of loss of his daily presence and prattling and of his babyhood. Some would say, focus on the positive. Skirt the pain. I'd like to be present with both.
The following poem was shared with me by my counselor, and it epitomizes the apparent contradictions of life's mud and rainbows, and the place for each. I do not know the author.

I loved my uncle's ranch when I was a child.

There was space to run unhampered

and freedom to explore.

The dust lay inches think upon the trails

and running barefoot down a path of sifted powder

was a sumptuous sort of feel.

The barn was my playground full of animated toys,

The loft was full of hay and mice and fairly friendly spiders.

The mint grew wild and plush beside the creek.

My auntmade berry pies

and the smell would seek me out

anywhere I played around the house.

I rode my cousin's palomino horse

through fantasies that never seemed to end.

If I'm careful, Lord, I can edit these thoughts and forget

that I got a bee sting when I picked the mint

and burned my tongue time and again on the berry pies

because I never seemed to learn and couldn't wait

that the barn smelled just awful

and the horse made my bottom sore

and the dust that felt like sifted powder

made me sneeze all summer.

If I'm careful, I can forget these things.

But if I'm wise,

I can remember that all of life has both things in it

and I may choose which part to hold to me.

Safe People

I came across this quote by George Eliot, on the comfort of true friendship, and it resonated with me.
" Oh, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping and then with a breath of kindness blow the rest away."
That faithful hand is often at the end of a long-distance phone line, but companionship and understanding is still deeply felt.
Thank you for being my safe people.

Simplicity

Simplicity is arranging life around a few consistent purposes

and excluding what is not necessary.

Dallas Willard

Rest

God created us for Himself, so that our soul is restless unless it finds its rest in Him.

St. Augustine

Dealing

" Deal with what is, not with what we want to be . . .

because then, we spend effort on what isn't.

-Hugh Prather

Each Unique

There is no best in a group of individuals.

-TAO TE CHING

Learning to Lighten Up

Not a shred of evidence exists

in favor of the idea that life is
serious. -Brendan Gill

Fear of Success

Few things cause more fear of success than a sense that if you follow your
dreams, you will betray the people who love you.

-Anne B Fisher, "Are you afraid of success?" Fortune July 8, 1996

Reality Check

"Stick to three concepts.

You can't help everyone.

You can't
change everything.

Not everyone is going to love
you."
-Roberta Vasko Kraus
sports psychologist

As a believer in Christ, we can tag on additional truths: There is One who can help everyone, One who can change anything, and One who won't ever stop loving you. Let Him handle it!

And as my dear Daddy has wisely put it:

All you can do, is all you can do. And all you can do, is enough.

(And I add, to PRAY is the best of all we can do)

Optimism

Most people are as happy as they make up their minds to be.
-Abraham Lincoln

Or, as a friend of Bill's likes to quip,

Have a nice day, unless you've made other plans!

Keepers of the Home

If we ever doubt the crucial value of the homes we create and maintain, let us remember...

"All of life is a cominghome. Salesmen. Secretaries. Coal
miners. Beekeepers. Sword swallowers. All of us . . .all the
restless hearts of the world . . . all trying to find a way home."
-Patch Adams

And let us keep them open to those still in search of One.

All Together?!!

You will never have it all together. That is like trying to eat once and for all.

-Anonymous

Giving it a try

"The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is
marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who
errs and comes short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the
great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at best, knows
the triumph of high achievement; and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least
fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and
timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt, April 23, 1910, in a speech to the University of Paris