Do I Fit In?

Everyone has insecurities, I know.  This is part of the human condition I guess.  Ever since I was a girl I have felt like I didn't truly fit in and I find myself struggling with this all these years later; nearly fifty-years-old.  There are reasons I suppose why I have struggled with this feeling all my life....

I was born the second of my family though raised as the firstborn due to my sister dieing in a tragic car accident; I was four when this happened.  I have two younger brothers.  We moved around nearly every year as I was growing up (this is a different story) and was always the new kid on the block...our family scraped by, lived on food stamps intermittently and so I did not fit in with the fashions of the day.  I loved school when it came to learning, but socially I felt like a misfit.  

I remember myself being a "late-bloomer".  I preferred to hang out with kids younger than me because they were doing crafts and learning new things while my peers were sitting around talking about boys, which I didn't care about at all.

When I got out of school it felt like things went better overall...

But, I began working at a nursing home with the elderly (whom I loved dearly), but there were few that were my age; I was nineteen when I started as a nurses' aide.  

As I progressed into my twenties, those who were my age were beginning to date and marry.  Still, I was not really wanting to date much unless I knew that they were a believer and kind of felt like a reject in the man department.  This "condition" persisted for nearly two decades.  

Fast forward to when I was thirty-eight, I met my husband and married after a two-year on/off long-distance dating relationship.  Now, I thought I had finally "arrived" to official adulthood and found I was in the same place (maybe only in my mind), but now we were older newlyweds.  Later we became older parents and we still do not fit with anyone...most of those who are our age, their kids are teens or have left the nest.   Those with younger children are one to two decades our junior.  The age vortex.

So, now I am nearly fifty and going to MOPS with my first child who is four.  How do I relate to those around me?  Maybe I am putting too much stock in this age thing.  I was never one to worry about this, but now I find myself skirting the whole age question and even feeling a bit embarrassed...

Then we go to a group with all empty-nesters and many of my friends are older...though I enjoy them all immensely and appreciate all their wisdom and experience that they pass on to us, there is a part of me that feels like I will never fit in there either...

Where do I belong?  

Misfit status once again, the story of my life.  We are betwixt the two generations in many ways and this just adds to my misfit status and so I tend to be a loner...I have never really seemed to relate well with those that are my own age...

Why does this bother me so much, to the point where I am writing a blog entry about this?  Not sure exactly, guess I should be used to this by now (as my mom would say), but feeling like you don't fit never quite fits well...

A Time for Thankfulness....

November 27, the last Thursday of the month, a day set aside for thanksgiving....a day that should really be the mark of all our days; gratitude...thank-FULL-ness!  I have not counted all the times in the Bible where we are exhorted, encouraged and entreated to be thankful.  To rejoice.  To remember the faithfulness of our God!  It would take some time to count, I am sure!  As I was getting ready this morning, this hymn came to my mind and I sang it with all my heart in the echo chamber of our shower.   I was reminded how many years prior I was attending one of my brother's weddings and as they had the pianist play and sing "Great is Your Faithfulness"  I was having an internal dialogue that went something like, "Lord, I don't really see your faithfulness to me....here I am still alone...estranged from my family with no signs of a husband on the horizon, you may be faithful to them (my brother and his soon-to-be-wife), but I fail to see your faithfulness to me.

For one thing, I know that God is big and He can handle my honest questions, my vulnerable heart's complaints and my downright entitled attitude sometimes.  I think that it is a healthy thing to talk to God with a bare, hurting soul before Him, He sees me anyway so there is no where that I can hide from His all-knowing, all-seeing nature.  I believe that my Heavenly Father was listening and feeling some of my pain as He knew that my vision was skewed, my heart was lonely and tired of waiting and my mind just did not understand all the whys of the wait.  He "gets" me now and He "got" me then too.

And secondly, He knew the journey that I was on and have been on until today.  He is calling me to all that He has for me and although He knows the whys of what is going on in my soul, the hurts or losses that I have been through; He still has plans for me to push through, to trust Him more fully in every area of life and so, He asks me to find something to be thankful for.  Why?  Because it changes me!  He know what is best for me! 

Have you ever noticed how hard it can be to be thankful?  I have noticed that even in the midst of our greatest blessings there are some of our deepest struggles and despairs that can overwhelm us to a place of total oblivion and numbness (if we are lucky...sometimes the pain is so great all we want is relief).  Life is hard even in the midst of miracles.  We have got to look for those blessings when we are surrounded by the day-to-day muck and mire of work, the repetitiveness of vacuuming and mopping that dirty floor one more time.  Do you need to eat again?  I have no idea what to make tonight!  Those things may seem petty, but they are real and they can drain the life right out me...they can zap that ounce of creativity I had left.  

Being thankful is a discipline and if you know how hard it is to push yourself off the sofa and onto your exercise machine then you know all about how discipline can be difficult to muster!  But, just like we need to work to keep our bodies healthy, so we must work to call our souls up and look, sometimes search, I mean sometimes comb our lives to find that minute thing to be thankful for and trust me, there is something no matter what you are going through!  Will you naturally do this when you are down and dealing with duties and difficulties, not likely; that's especially why we need to be intentional about it!

Another thing I thought of regarding cultivating the attitude of thankfulness is living in the moment!  Why not revel in this one quiet moment when the house is still; rather than worrying about all I have to do tomorrow?  Worry will kill joy quicker than anything!  Taking that moment with my son; he is changing so fast already.  Enjoying that long embrace with my husband; he may be gone tomorrow, who knows what tomorrow will bring?  Spending that time with a friend, be all there with her!

So, at least once a year we are reminded to be full of thanks!  To give thanks!  To essentially realign our hearts once again with the one who gives so many blessings for us to enjoy.  So, what am I thankful for?  Though we wait for another baby to love, I am grateful for the one God (and his birthmother) gifted us with over four years ago.  Though I am saddened at the apparent decades long rift in our family, I am grateful for a family that invited us in to have a birds' eye view of the love they have for one another.  Though married life is so much harder than I ever knew, God has given me the opportunity to learn how to love unselfishly and a husband that loves me beyond what I deserve.  Though I struggle with life on so many levels; my perfect Father loves me and says that "I will never leave you or forsake you"

And, for all these things and more; I will FOREVER be gratefu!  "Thanks be to God for His indescribeable gifts"  Not just today, but everyday I will seek to live in gratitude, to find as to search for hidden treasure, the little miracles in each day!

Struggling...

My husband brought up moving to me last night, again....He brings it up every month or two. Just when I think I he is"okay" with his job, with living here in these beautiful mountains...

I have lived in Montana since 1992; a big move from living in the Green Mountain State.  I first came out here to be a part of Youth With A Mission.  I started with a Discipleship  Training School and took a mission trip to Australia.  After my stint there I started working for an area nursing home and saved money to go back to YWAM where I then did a School of Worship and did a missions trip along the west coast of the United States praying and doing conferences of sorts about worship.  

Fast forward to October 2005 when Kent and I married after a year of long-distance dating in Florida and then he moved here...it's kind of a long story.  Anyway, there are a lot of things drawing him back to Florida.  His aging parents still live in Florida along with his two sisters.  The funny thing is they are from South Dakota where they farmed ever since he was a boy.  He has always regretted that his dad had to sell the farm, but that is another story...

The crazy thing is I never remember thinking that I might end up in Florida...guess that is what love does...

So, here we are on the precipice of making a huge decision...a decision that at this point seems elusive.  Kent complains that one day I am okay with it and saying I will support him and then the next time I am upset and angry that we have to move.  It is true!  I am having a hard time buying into this decision wholeheartedly.  I am not convinced that all of the issues that he faces here will somehow miraculously be eliminated simply by moving there.  

How do I get my heart to agree with him and move in that direction happily?  I know I need to give him a wholehearted "Yes", in order for him to feel honored and supported.  I need to give him a chance.  My thoughts start racing and my fears start rising and his face turns crestfallen.  

I know that God is the one who holds my future in His hands.  It is hard trusting an imperfect man with your life, but ultimately it is God who I am railing against.  It is God that I am choosing not to trust with my future.  I am struggling...I don't want to live in a big city with big highways and lots of traffic and crime.  The lifestyle there is completely different.  Why can't he just make it work here?!  

If we are to move there, I will move.  That is my role as a wife.  Whether he is happy in his jobs plays a huge role in whether we are happy as a family.   With God's help I can scale a wall.  This could be an adventure if I choose to see it that way.  I need to give God my frustrations, my fears and my friendships...He is able to do much more than I could ever ask or think!  Will I lay down the struggle to hold on to His hand?  I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.  Lord give me the strength!  

The Tyranny and Gift of Time...

It is hard to not get swept up by the tyranny of the urgent and not just the urgent, but the myriad of distractions that we face everyday.  Sometimes we just have too many choices.  When I have an afternoon with less work than usual, I find I come up with so many possibilities that oftentimes I am paralyzed by the overwhelming options...

How do we spend our time?  Hmmmm...I could read a book or....I could write a poem or work on my writing course or watch a television program or go for a walk or see what's going on in the FaceBook world, call a friend, play my guitar, play the piano or take a nap....the choices are endless!

Do you ever have times when it is just so hard to decide what you want to do that you end up doing nothing of real significance?  It is the tyranny of too many choices sometimes sandwiched by the urgent needs or perceived urgent needs that press upon my mind all the time.  Does anyone have this figured out?  I feel pulled in so many different directions that sometimes I am overwhelmed by all the possibilities.  I used to train caregivers at a homecare agency here in town.  I remember I used to talk about how clients with dementia need choices, simple choices such as, "Would you like to wear this pink shirt or this blue one?" or, "Would you like macaroni and cheese tonight or soup?"  as opposed to, "What would you like to wear?" (Out of a closet full of possibilities) or "What would  you like to eat tonight?" and again, out of a thousand-and-one choices.

On the subject of choices; have you ever been stressed out by just how many choices we have in deodorants?  Would you like fresh scent or flower scent?  Would you like liquid roll-on or a dry application?  Would you like it to be cheap or do you care?  Sooooo, maaaannny choices that it can make you crazy, just wanting to run out of the store screaming sometimes (at least I do).  Can you believe you are reading a blog about deodorants?

So, how do we narrow the field in our lives (not just at the store) so that we are effective, we are doing God's will instead of the will of everyone around us and their pet projects and what they think we are called to help them with?

There are no easy answers...I think it boils down to what is God calling us to do?  Where do our interests lie?  What are we good at?  What do others comment on regarding our talents and giftings? What do we enjoy?  Maybe we (I) make it more complicated then it needs to be, trying to spread ourselves (myself) so thin that I am not effective anywhere.

The Life of Richness...

My husband has a new job working for a billionaire.  This man is very generous and definitely takes care of his employees for which we are incredibly grateful.  We were invited to a yearly fourth of July party complete with helicopters flown in for the event as well as guys who came out of nowhere parachuting with little motors.  The party was nothing like anything I had ever seen, we certainly cannot comprehend living a life with that much wealth, it was mind-blowing!

The decorations were like an upscale wedding under a huge tent.  White roses and hydrangea.  It is beyond comprehension really; this lavish life!

The carnival that we attended was seemingly over the top as well.  I had never seen anything like it!  There were rides set up just like the county fair only on a smaller scale complete with the carnival workers. My son got to ride the rides with no lines or waiting.  He could practically stay on any of the ones that he wanted for as long as he wanted!  We could go to the snack shop and order whatever we wanted at no cost to us!  Cotton candy, hot dogs, fry bread; you name and it was ours for the asking! We even won stuffed animals that were better than any prizes I had ever won at any other fair in my lifetime.  So we ended up having our hands full as we finally decided we had had enough and took our exhausted bodies to the car dragging the hugest Dumbo you could ever see and "Arnold" our new adopted alligator to home-sweet-home.  Amazing!  Frivolous!  Scandalous in its lavishness (At least to my humble eyes).

Lavishness...that is the heart of our generous, loving Father.  He owns it all!  Everything!  He desires to give to us so much more than we can hold.  Abba Daddy!  The one that loves us beyond measure. he longs for us to receive.  He desires that we would enjoy all that He has for us.  I am thinking so far beyond material things.  His Word says that He will make ALL grace abound to us so that we would have ALL that we need....abounding in everything...everything that really matters!  I think of the believers who live in India or Africa or any number of impoverished areas of our world...are they doing something wrong that they are poor?  I don't believe that for a moment!  In so many ways I think they are richer in their understanding of what riches are; true riches.  To know the love of God in such a deep way that you can abide with great peace whether with little or much.  To know the peace of God in one's heart whether living in a war torn land or living in the chaos of a dog-eat-dog world.

I think of the story of Rich Mullins, the singer and writer of poems and stories that are rich in meaning and raw emotion...he was at the top of the Contemporary music industry in the eighties with "Awesome God" among many other well known Christian songs that are now classics...when he made it to the top, so to speak, he made a lot of money.  But, he only took what was the average salary  of a working man for his wages and did not even know how much money he actually made. His life was rich with the love and grace of God (as expressed through his music and interviews), so much so, that the things of this world did not appear to tempt him.

That is the richness that I want...a richness of the spirit, a knowing in my heart, an understanding of the lavishness of the goodness of God in my life.  I want "rose-colored glasses" or shall I say, "God-colored glasses"; glasses that see the blessings of God in my life no matter what may be going on in and around me.  Does this attitude come naturally to me?  I wish I could say that it did, but it is definitely a discipline I must intentionally cultivate.

That is my heart's desire; to live the life of richness...in my soul!

The Bittersweet of Life...

Have you ever noticed how life can be so bittersweet?  There are days that I am down...wondering why about so many things.  There are days that I don't think I can contain the joy and yet, there are times where it vacillates from pure joy and contentment to utter despair and desperation within only moments of each other...

I don't think there is a day that goes by that my heart does not ache for losses and griefs that stick to me like "cling-ons".

Life is tough!  Though God blesses us with bits of joy....times of laughter....moments of love and even understanding from those around us. But, it doesn't take long and we end up facing loneliness, misunderstanding from those we want so desperately to "get" us and we, in turn, do the same to those we love too.  How can this be? I think I have way more questions than answers and the older I get the dumber I get.  Do you know what I mean?  In some ways I feel wiser and more experienced and in even more ways I feel like I miss the mark more and more.  My patience runs thin with myself as well as those around me...you would think after four decades I would've learned to relax, but relaxing does not come easily to a self-proclaimed type A personality...

I tend to over-think, over-analyze and over-do...it feels like a curse most of the time.  How do we understand others if we cannot even understand ourselves?  Aren't you glad that God "gets" us even if no one else does?

Our Simple Church closed yesterday...it was a small group of believers that met for almost four years in various hotels during its lifespan.  It did not come as a complete shock to me as I had had many conversations with the pastor's wife...but, it is still bittersweet.  Our times of simple worship were sweet.  The friendships forged there were genuine, were solid, were precious.  Not that that will end, but it will morph to a different waterline...it will take much more intentionality to nurture some of these friendships, which maybe is a good thing.  Those that will remain will rise to the top.  Just like the expected death of a loved one; once it happens their death still brings great grief and loss.  This transition is good, I know it is...because God is good.  Where we will call our church  home, it is beyond our knowing at this time; but God knows!  It is an adventure awaiting us.  It is bittersweet nonetheless....

This past week a good friend moved; another loss of sorts although I am sure we will still be in contact.

Last weekend I was a part of Tres Dias; helping out on the music team.  Lives were changed.  Hearts were encouraged and hope restored.  The prayer prayed by a man behind the curtain during Saturday evenings serenade brought me to tears; not out of sadness, but out of feeling the blessing of God's voice speaking over me to go forward without shame, to know that Jesus truly does love me and although I carry grief each and every day of my life...He sustains me and "He brings beauty from ashes, strength for fear, gladness for mourning and peace for despair".

With the bittersweet of life how can anyone face another day without the lover of their soul holding them up?  I fear I would have given in to the fear and sadness a long time ago and would've either thrown the towel in completely or trudged through life trying to pull up my own bootstraps and woefully carrying my burdens through the arduous journey called my life tired, worn and beaten down.

I don't know about anyone else, but I for one can only sing in the midst of my bittersweetness as Fernando Ortega sings"Just Give me Jesus...."

Injustice

We all face it.  We all wish it wasn't so.  But, sooner or later we will all have to deal with it.  Injustice!  The world is full of those who suffer under injustice...why must it be so?  This is the age-old question we would all like to have answered.  Sin is what brought unfairness.  It was never God's plan that His people would have to deal with the atrocities that we now hear about in the news, deal with in our families or that we hear about half way across the world.  Rape, child abuse, drugs, alcohol, gossip, people vying for power and control...it is all sin; all born out of our rebellion to God, wanting to do it our own way.  I guess we should be happy now, this is what is called our own way; each man doing what he thinks is right apart from God.

We have been dealing with a small measure of injustice in our world through my husband's work.  He had the rug pulled out from under him this past week with someone blasting him with profanities for no apparent reason.  He was left reeling and wondering what that was all about.  Many people tried to tell him it had nothing to do with him, but the question seems to lurk under the surface; "What did I do wrong?"  He is a lead landscaper and now cannot tell what's what, seeming confusion and mayhem that overtook the order and beauty that he was creating.  Now he stands and watches as others take the credit and ruin what he has created.  He is angry.  He is frustrated.  He is hopeless; at the mercy of those who are more powerful over him in this hierarchy of control.

This is just a small example of injustice (although big to us at the moment) and yet this takes place all over the globe with no apparent solution to the evil that permeates every darkened corner.

There is hope!  There is one who will prevail over evil in due time; all in due time...in the meantime, we will choose to trust in the one who will exact justice on the world, not yet, but in due time...

Tick Tock Goes the Clock

Another year has come and gone;

As time just keeps on ticking by,

Why does the clock like to pass time so much?

The hands go by with no reply.

Another year shows on my face;

More wrinkles in the signs of time,

Sometimes I wish I could turn it back

Then the midnight toll ring's out it's chime...

So, here I sit forced to look back

At the year of two thousand thirteen;

So many things I've left undone

And still other challenges  unforeseen.

Some words I wish I could've left unsaid

Yet still others if only I had shared;

For all that really matters in this life

Is the love of God that cannot be compared.

There were ups and there were downs,

As everyone can agree, I'm sure;

But here we stand at the brinkf

Of a blank slate calling us with hope's allure.

The voice of two thousand fourteen calls out,

Inviting me and you  to come and see,

There's so much more life to be lived,

Adventure awaits, that's a guarantee!

We can only imagine or guess

What awaits us around another bend...

There  will certainly be both joy and sorrow,

But through it all we have a faithful friend!

Lord, teach us to number our days aright

For these moments will quickly slip away;

Seize the moment, take life by the tail,

And let's not forget to pray!

"Cause surely we will need our God to help,

To cover us with grace once more,

He will never leave us or forsake us;

So, let's unwrap all that is in store!