It begins with a run on sentence and then I break it down.

It occurred to me this morning to wonder if my consuming attention to a stray cat who came to play in our yard and beg for milk and food one day when I was 5, and my insistence that the cabbage patch doll I received when I was 8 was a "real baby," was in part fueled by the death of my baby sister when I was three years old.  

"It's NOT a doll!  It's a real baby!"

Maybe all girls who grew up in the '80's were like this.  

     The cat came to live with us after a week of begging at our door, and me doing the inside begging work on it's behalf.  The problem with the cat was that it lived a year before getting himself killed, and we had to bury him in the back yard.  I wrote an epitaph and posted a tombstone.  On the night he died, I remember I removed myself and my broken heart from the table to weep my grief in my bedroom.  The other family members were already talking about maybe getting a dog.  I felt betrayed by their lack of keeping this moment for our shared memories and grief. Grief over the cat who had lived among us for a year, who I had loved and cradled as a baby.  But they were not the ones to have hurried home from Kindergarten each day, in hopes that this stray collarless cat who had wandered to our porch and had been fed, (milk, tuna fish) would be there waiting for me.  I would scoop him up into my arms.   I was the one who's heart instantly bled for this cat, knowing that we needed each other, and yet it was my oldest brother who was given the privilege of naming the cat.  My brother, who thought "Jenny" was a good name for a cat.  I think it was the name of a girl he liked at school.  (Jenny's were everywhere in the '80's.) And then when we learned the cat was actually a boy, my brother and my Dad decided to name him Jake, because we had recently watched a Disney movie about a cat who could talk, and that cat's name was "Jake."  I was a cat mother who had not been bestowed the blessing of naming my own child.  In my love of said child, I quickly got over this slight.

     And then the Cabbage Patch Kid(s) happened, which was probably the most important invention of all time.  These dolls were not all the same, they had different hair color, eye color, dimples, or not, freckles, or not, boys, or girls, with pacifiers or without, and they had individual birth certificates with individual names.  As the adoptive parent, you could choose to officially have the name changed, if you sent the form in with your autograph.  And some of the given names were quite strange.  But that was the nature of the Cabbage Patch.  You never knew what you might get.  Or I should say "Who."  The other reason these "kids" were so popular is that they were hard to acquire.  Your parents had to stand in line outside of the warehouse and catch them as they were thrown off of the delivery truck.  They never made it to the store shelves.  And I, like all of my peers, wanted a Cabbage Patch Kid So. Very. Much.  And so I would pray that when I got home from school that day, there would be my very own Cabbage Patch Kid waiting for me at home.  Never happened.  Then Christmas time, circa 1984.  Let's just start out by saying it was good, so good, to be an 8 year old girl at Christmas time in 1984.  If you weren't in to the Cabbage Patch, there were also Care Bears, Rainbow Brite, herself the Elf, and My Little Pony.  The 8 year old girl had much to be thankful for circa 1984, circa God Bless the USA.  

     That Christmas, I honed my Christmas Present gift spy detective skills by offering to water the Christmas tree often.  This was before the fake tree revolution, when you had to water the tree by hand.  So I would take my time and think NO ONE COULD EVER TELL that I was actually looking for any new presents under the tree which had my name on them.  I was looking for a VERY specifically shaped box.  It was not there.  But there was one box in exactly the same shape as a Rainbow Brite box, so I was convinced I was getting Rainbow Brite.  Commence the mental self talk of trying to not be disappointed, and be able to receive my Rainbow Brite with a grateful, non comparing heart.  

     On Christmas Eve, my cousin casually told me "You're getting a Cabbage Patch kid for Christmas."  It didn't matter that she wasn't supposed to be telling this to me because I didn't believe her. She said "I'm not lying, you really are getting one."  This cousin was 6 years older than me, already a teenager, and she had a cabbage patch kid already; in fact, I believe she had boy twin cabbage patch kids.  But to her, it was more of a novelty item than the cry of her heart to adopt her own child, to have and to hold from this day forward and always care for with the utmost of concern and attention to details.  

  Christmas morning.  Opening presents.  We always took turns opening one present at a time.  It prolonged the suspense and made us actually see what each person had received.  When it was my turn, I was handed the Rainbow Brite box.  I was at peace with this moment, having had weeks to sort out my feelings on the matter in the privacy of my own heart.  So I opened the box.  It was not a Rainbow Brite box after all, but the box the cabbage patch kid comes in before it gets placed in the fancy store box.  I was shocked.  Happy shock like a sugar coma invasion on my nervous system.  Now we girls circa 1984, we were just like real grown up pregnant ladies who have their pre conceived notions of what their upcoming baby will look like.  "I want a red haired blue eyed girl with a pacifier."  this was what my friend Debbie had wished for; this is what her father had happened to catch off of a delivery truck outside of Toys R Us at 6am one morning.  But also, just like real grown up mothers, whatever my ideals for the perfect child were were thrown out of consciousness the moment I actually laid eyes on my actual child.  She was a girl, with brown braids, tan skin, and brown eyes.  She was perfect.  I would not wish to change a thing about her, because she was mine.  Her given name was Darlene Ernesta, and I did not feel right changing her birth name.  Even though people would say that a name like "Ernesta" was "weird."

  Never mind that talk, Darlene, you pay them no mind.  For I, too have an usual middle name, so really, like mother, like daughter.   

     Maybe I was unique in my attachment and attention to what was, in all crassness, a plastic item.  Maybe my yearning and ease at which I drew cats and Cabbage Patch kids alike into my ever mothering arms was because of the staggering loss I could not even then fully comprehend when my baby sister had died, leavening me with a huge gape ripped out of my heart before I had ever left the age of three. 

 Or 

   Maybe all the other 8 year old girls growing up in the '80's were just like this,  too.   Just trying to sort out the various babies and cats and children in our hearts.  Just trying to mother our lost babies.  Even the ones of which we were not yet aware.

Thanks for the giving

I will remember to 

give thanks for the giving

when the giving tore your flesh apart

tore the veil and forever

the scar that healed all of mine.

I will remember, give thanks for the giving scar

the proof of a God's human living 

even when the giving felt my heart ripped apart

and my giving stops if I chip a fingernail

(I have not given to the point of blood, unrecognizable face)

even when my soul feels broken it has not

and even if I had, it's life to death to life,

for another soul's life to life.

The ripping, the tearing, the breaking, the scars, 

so God can enter even this flesh

(But even if, say "Thank you" then.)

(rest is a state of mind)

Father, teach my mind, my heart, to rest.

For I am your tired child, and I am sore.

your rest is calm, and serious,

it is me asleep beneath this shield.

my faith is the shield I yield,

(but the battle is the LORD'S.)

and I keep it

posted high above my head;

but Father help me when it takes

all my strength

just to lift these arms and

my hands shake,

so tired from carrying a load and so many things I never

knew how to let go of and only only

hold what you put in them

(the shield in one hand, the sword in the other)

Would you lift these arms with the strength behind your own

(called easy and light)

this child inside is knocking, trapped behind a wall

beneath my skin grown hard

(I wore myself out constructing what I was never meant to construct)

but

with each knock a new brick falls

and through the cracks, your light

is beginning to shine,

and this tired child is waking up to see your glory.

"Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you." 

Psalm 116:7

With a word

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.  In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."

John 1:1-5 

The more time that I expend in this life, the more obvious it becomes to me that ALL LIFE is not only precious, but that it is miraculous. 

  Hello, one year old son; you never existed and now here you are. 

Just Like "Poof! Here's your baby."

Breath of God, speaking you into existence. 

 Before you were born, you just weren't here, you just. weren't. here.  I mean, I could feel you wiggling around on the other side of my belly, huge with the proof of you, but the blankets were empty, the crib, my arms, all empty.  And we didn't know what you looked like.  And we couldn't imagine your smell.  And then in an instant, you were here, a solid baby form to hold, wrapped in skin and whaling and blinking around.  

"Michelle, life is not a miracle, it is totally normal.  Babies are born every day.  "Miracles" are things that do not just happen every day.  Impossible things becoming possible."

My baby is an impossible thing that became possible.

What I mean by that is this evidence: 

We moved into this house 18 months ago, and there was no baby boy living here.  Now I look down from the sink where I am rinsing a dish, and there I see a one year old son, wearing a hoodie and jeans, drinking a cup of milk, and just standing there.  And he is so cute that all I want to do is pick him up and squeeze and whisper in his ear.  So I do that.   And then he smiles and giggles and says something really brilliant.  

Because out of the mouth of babies, that's why.

    

"As the rain and snow come down from Heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth; it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it."  Isaiah 55:10-11

So do not go on assuming that human words lack power.  For if by His word, God created us in His own image, the very image of God, then I think we must probably assume that there is a weaker measure of power in the words we the created say, too.
  My son has learned that he can say the word "cheese," and cheese appears in front of him.  It was in the refrigerator, out of his sight, and therefore out of existence, and then because he said the word, I placed it there on his high chair tray, in broken up baby bite size pieces.  My son cannot feed himself yet, but his word made an impossible thing possible, right before his very eyes.
What power there.  A word.

"Through the praise of children and infants

 you have established a stronghold against your enemies, 

to silence the foe and the avenger."

Psalm 8:2

When our son speaks, even those baby words have the power to light up my husband's face, and mine reflected there. He may only be saying the word "cat," which sounds like "gat" as he turns the book to the exact page with the cat on it,  but even just that word when it rings from within my son's mind and off of his tongue lands inside our hearts, sparks what feels like a million tiny spark plugs as it travels through each cell all the way to our very tippy toes and gives life to an ever growing joy.

"Congratulations, It's a.....JOY!"

"So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female, He created them."        Genesis 1:27

This Morning, the fallen leaves

This morning, the fallen leaves on the ground
looked like rainbow colored stars
touched down at my feet,
like I could walk upon eternity,
like God had shaken and reversed a few things.

The only way to have perfect legs

The only way to have perfect legs is to be a baby

soft with fresh energy coursing invisible veins

and short enough that everything around you is big and new

 still to be discovered

still to be delighted in and trampled through.

The only way to have perfect legs is to become old

and to have run your race on the same two legs

long after the boredom and nothing longer sparkles

nor has it since...when?

long after running left your soul mud stained and trampled on

definition of muscle is the result of all you ran to

and from

and up against

and all you never gave up running for

even when your lungs burned hot and hard

the times running looked like crawling walking resting waiting

for the light on the corner of a decision to change

which changed you until you were

finally soft once more as your legs were at first, 

with blue red veins visible now

after all that they carried you through on the way to developing

your perfect legs

resting tired

below your head and lower

than your heart.

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles.  And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.  For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning it's shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God."  

Hebrews 12:1, 2

(This poem was inspired by a picture I took of my baby boy's almost 17 month old legs as he stood on his tippy toes to be closer to the music.)

As long as I inhabit this flesh

"...those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor.  And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment." 

1 Corinthians 12:22-24

...but what do you do if your "unpresentable" is something that was meant to be "presentable?"

My hair, again.  

So here we go again.  There are things happening in my life for which I do not have the answer.  These I daily lay at the feet of Jesus and ask Him to resolve.  And there are things I daily struggle with that have, I would say, no significance.  Except that they are significant in the way they are shaping and softening and taming my soul.

  It's about my hair. 

Isn't it always about my hair?

     Dear Lord, thank you for the way you created me, and for knowing every hair on my head.  I know those hairs, too, and we are not friends.  You and I are friends, but the hair and I are not, never have been, and I see this as being my worst feature, naturally, even worse than my bunion toes.  Even worse than my tendency to use run on sentences and be proud and hateful.   My hair trumps all that, because that is the degree to which I am weak and human and self loathing in ways I wish I could tell you I am not. But this is how you made me, so to YOU be the glory in your creation of little me, here on planet Earth and struggling with very unbeautiful things except in the way they are beautifying my soul. 

Love, Michelle 

 Very honest here.

  I have always viewed my very fine hair as a handicap.  A very painful handicap which was the first thing anyone ever saw of me, and then dismissed me right off by.  Kids can be so cruel.  The cruelty of child peers can stick to your insides.

    Fast forward to today.  I was interval running on the highest incline of the treadmill, which is when all of my brain electrodes start firing off at each other.  Today, they said to each other, "Today is the day to highlight your hair.  Do it as soon as you get home."  This thought occurred to me out of nowhere very fast.  No thought, then bam, full thought fully completed within the time span of double zero seconds.  Folks, this is why we have assurance that eternity exists: the fact that we can have a complete thought in zero seconds.  That it takes no time at all, Earth time, to get from point A to point Z.  

    Came home, applied the highlighter cap, mixed the highlighter mix, applied to my head, left it on for an hour.  Washed with the special shampoo packet, dried, styled, wha la. 

     The thing is, when you wear daily and publicly a part of yourself which you are not entirely delighted by, or which you feel downright ashamed by, you find ways to take extra special care of it.  You use the shampoo, you use the curling irons, the straightening irons, the tools.  And you become less perfectionistically picky about it.  Someone else's "good enough, almost," becomes your "Awesome hair day!" which happens um, 1x a year?  And then you want to take a thousand pictures to document it because it happened that one day, and you don't even know why, but sometimes it's because of the shirt you are wearing.  I can tell and sort of manipulate the type of hair day I will have based on the shirt I wear that day.  Does this happen to anyone else?  I wonder.  

     I have spent many, many minutes, hours, days, bemoaning my hair to the Lord.  I have cried, yes grieved, over this part of myself.  I have felt utter shame and self contempt, unpresentable.  I have asked, begged, the Lord to change this part of my appearance.  You know, He could have easily done a hair miracle on me. He still can; I do not doubt it.  But I also look back and realize that maybe, just maybe, this part of me that lacked glory was for a greater glory which I could not see, which belonged only to HIM.  

Such is the nature of anything truly beautiful.

    Try to rewrite any major aspect of your life (so far) narrative, and you see that it doesn't work.  You take out the sorrow here, the sadness here, the humiliation there, and you realize that you would not be the person you are today.  If I had been born with the type of hair I have envied on other people's heads, I would be a lot more shallow, a lot more insensitive to ANY of the sufferings of anyone else.  

     What are you insecure about?  Is there something you wish the LORD would change about your make up, whether physical, mental, or emotional?  Then in that area, you can relate and have an extra heart of compassion for those who struggle in the same area as you.  And if you struggle in ANY area,  then you can relate to the struggles of others in EVERY area.  

I like the effect of the highlights in my hair today.  

I have learned over the years to work with what I have in ways that I like.  And it's this not just waking up and looking like an after picture but having to work at it which has built a strength in me  I could have in no other way known.  Much like working a weak muscle over the years and months, and finding one day that there is genuine muscle tone in that area of your body which you never actually thought was possible.

Take heart in this: Because I do not like my natural hair, what do you think is the first thing I notice on other people?  Involuntarily, I notice and appreciate their hair.  I THINK YOU ALL HAVE AMAZING HAIR, EVERY DAY!  The parts of myself that I never think twice about?  I hardly notice those parts on other people, too.  For this is the way of human nature.  And God loves us, yes he does, in all of our self loathing pride (that is not an oxymoron, it is the same thing) and he can use even our simplest of vanity to bless and further His kingdom when we submit it to Him.

This daily laying down, 

it feels a lot like getting to know God in astonishing ways which will surprise you,

and soften you,

and show you the pride which you had titled  "insecurity" to mask it's ugliness

Sometimes bacon is just bacon

Before writing comes talking.

When I was 6 years old, my family vacationed at my Grandmother's house two states away.  One morning when I was still upstairs with my family, I said "I smell the bacon Grandma's makin'." My mother said "Michelle, you wrote a poem!" I remember that she smiled as she said it.

     I had said "I smell the bacon grandma's makin'" because we were at Grandma's house, and Grandma was making bacon, and I could smell it, and I was too lazy of speech to add the "g" to the end of the word "making."  I was not trying to be clever or cute or creative, and I was most certainly not trying write a poem.  I was trying to state the obvious. Children are good at stating the obvious, lacking the filter of political correctness of thought and speech, and therefore the things they say are often considered "really creative" to grown ups who have lost the ability to see what's right in front of their faces, and call it what it is.  

     In any case, I was six years old and my mother had just unknowingly labeled me "Michelle you  wrote a poem," and so just as I carried the title "Fast runner" across my chest which my father had named me,  (see previous post, and the one before that) From the age of six years old, I also have carried the name "Michelle you just wrote a poem" because of my mother.  

   ...though I had not actually written anything.  

Yet.

     But I would later write in my own handwriting on my own paper, with pens the color of my choosing. I would write what was inside my head and pour it out like brain ink.  I tried creatively.  There was a lot happening inside my head, and much of it (I realized) Did not look like the lives I saw my peers living out.  Confirmation of this was conversations I would have with them.  

Example: "No, I don't ever think to sit by myself and write poems.  Or stories.  Or anything.  That doesn't sound like fun to me."  -so said my nameless 10 year old girl friend.  

     My Best friend.

9 year olds who think deeply and carry a wound about which they ruminate are not always the norm.

     Carry on to Junior High.  

     I began to approach my teachers with piles of poetry and short stories I had written.  "If you have time, would you mind going over these and critiquing them for me?"  7th grade English teacher, 8th grade English teacher.  Then in High school, 9th grade English (Honors English, at this point) teacher.  He was the best critic because he was not kind. 

 "This is not a good poem.  This one is just...bad." 

 "You are mixing metaphors here, and it doesn't make sense.  'Roses' do not 'harden like rocks.' Choose one metaphor and stick with it, and make sure that it makes sense." 

 And so the words on papers I had written in the privacy of my notebook exposed were slashed through red from the markings of his pen.  

But sometimes at the bottom of a poem, just these words:

 "I like it." 

 Or even: "VERY good." 

Sometimes these words were even double or triple underlined to prove his point.  

 11th grade, 12th grade.  I learned to take the pointers seriously, and found that more often, less words, but positive ones, were what was written at the bottom of the page.

     I was determined to work at this.  

     It was a muscle that needed to be exercised and not let atrophy.  

(I have at times since gone through periods of doing either or both. 

(See first post on this particular blog, for example.)

     There is more to this story, but I do not feel the need to write it all now, here. 

( Learning to edit myself, space her out, "subtlety" often being a thing on which I need to work.  

(See makeup looks of mine from even last week, for example.)

(OK fine.  Yesterday.)

I got to thinking about it because of a conversation I heard two days ago.  Two word loving writer women (It turns out I was actually not the only deep thinking 9 year old, writing her thoughts creatively in the still of her lonely bedroom) discussing how to promote written work, even a blog, or a book.  How to get readers and such.  I am not motivated in that way.  I write because I need to write, and because it makes me happy, and because I feel like it's a bonding thing between me and the Lord; projects He helps me work on and finish.  And then I feel so happy when I have completed the work. 

If someone else stumbles upon it and can relate and realize something, then all the better.  I take that to mean that the LORD is using it beyond what I ever could.   I am careful about who I share it with.  I have been hurt by unnecessary harsh criticisms of those who had no idea what they were talking about.  This is a very different thing than constructive criticism by people who are wise and learned and know.  The difference is the difference between a pig carelessly traipsing mud across your heart and sitting on it, and a cow licking the dirt off, leaving it as shiny as it can possibly be, then walking away from it.

    Think about that,

     And do what you do,

    always offering it up as a sweet sacrifice to the service of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Speaking for the vast minority

My father and I are a vast minority.

The concept of parents is such an interesting one.  Take a person with all of his collected bits of eye color, blood type, failures and mistakes,  generations of talent and addiction and temperament, mix them up and pour them into this one new little person, let's start out a new person with all of that, her DNA bearing the silent witness to a life not confessed.  

    My Dad intrigues me.

    I have not always said this.  His moods often got in the way of my ability to see their deeper meaning; how it sparked deep within me.  My father was at times angry, at times depressed, but I see too that he was not a guarded man, as so many learn to become.  He was always raw nerve, and always felt to the nerve ending.  There are some people who find the world to be too painful of a place; try to do the good that is in their heart to do, and feel every slight that comes back at them from a world that doesn't care about their backbreaking good deeds and hard work, done in the name of trying to serve the Lord their God and take care of their families.  Some people don't just play the game they see around them and are punished by it from those who wish they would just play the game already!  Some people feel very keenly throughout their bones the sense that "This world is not my home, and in it I do not fit." My Dad is one of those.  I see the lines on his face from how it plagues him.  I feel the sting of his every whip lash of rejection or the perception of rejection.  But His perception was probably right.  Sensitive types, we sense things, often with sharp accuracy.  The sharp accuracy of a paring knife to the heart of the matter and to the heart of myself.

     This does not excuse, it just does explain.  

My Father has never been a yeller, he is meek and mild and humble and kind.  He is soft spoken.  But there is a way of softly speaking your misplaced griefs that can sound like yelling, can feel like yelling to the young girl listening when you don't even know she is listening, and later she will say that you had just yelled at her, though you never had raised your voice.  

     (My mother, she was the yeller.  But that is another story I may never care to tell.) 

    I am like my father.

I did not realize this until very very recently.  My judgement and perception of the man were clouded by his layered years of pain and struggle.  But do you know that you can often lift a cloud or fog of confusion just by talking to a person in a gentle, kind voice, and drawing him out of the stream of his own self doubt?  And by doing this, you see to the heart, the golden heart inside the man shrouded, and you realize: all the things I like the best about myself are the things I inherited from him.

 All of the things I like best about myself are the things I inherited from my father. 

He was a consistent exerciser, believed in taking care of his body, keeping it in good shape.  I have memories engraved of him doing push ups and sit ups when he first woke up in the morning, still in his striped pajamas, the kind of pajamas men used to wear.  Lifting the free weights that lay scattered around the house, usually in a corner of his bedroom or the living room.  He never told me I had to exercise, but at night after dinner, he would take my brothers and I out to play football in the front yard.  I went to school and told all the kids, "My front yard is so big, you can play football in it!"  "NO it's not," argued a blond haired kid named Jeff.  Jeff had never seen my yard, had never played football there.  What did he know.  

Dear blond kid Jeff I-don't-remember-your-last-name, I never told you my front yard was NFL regulation size.  I said it was big enough to play football.  As evidenced by the fact that my Dad, three brothers and I would play football there every night.

Sincerely,

Michelle

 These were the early single digit years before the last heartache which broke my father's will and sapped his strength and left a shell of the man labeled "depressed" and 'bitter," who still worked hard though it took everything out of him without again refilling.  But during those pre-depression formative years, we played football, we ran and threw the ball far, we tackled hard, and I was first labeled a fast runner, and I have carried that name across my chest like an invisible badge. 

     I have been a consistent exerciser my entire adult life; caught, not taught.  Or taught, but by accident; the brilliant accident that is show, don't tell.

My father was also a man with a medal detector, and we would have beach days where he combed the beach for treasures, stopping whenever his metal detector beeped in his ears, which meant that there was something metal hiding right there, beneath the surface of the sand.  Then he would start to dig.

He found class rings, wedding rings, and was able to do a little research and return them to their owners.  Once, he found a gun powder flask from the Civil War. 

 My father also took the time to collect things like agates and rocks.  

I collect rocks, I collect sea glass, and I love to scour thrift stores.  My father and I both understand the appeal of thick glass, imperfect with bubbles inside of it, and of old glass that has turned purple with age.  My Father and I, we love those things, and can discuss the merits of a good rock, the kind we would love to have in our rock collection.  

      His kind of sensitive heart has always known the real treasure is with the LORD, and it was his passion to teach me this, but the sort of passion that looks like meekness and mild walked out.  

     "I'm scared at night," my four year old self told my father.

     "I have nightmares of scary spiders and things."

     My father went into the living room and took down from off of the wall a large picture that was hanging there.  It was a picture of Jesus, kneeling to pray right before he was about to be crucified.  Jesus at His most vulnerable moment of desperate prayer, and in the background, you can see his disciples, sleeping.  My father said "When you start to feel scared, look at Jesus."  as he placed the large picture at the end of my small bed. 

-XOXO,

I no longer count the miles

"Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives' tales; rather, train yourself to be godly.  For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come." -1 Timothy 4:7-8

I run.

Not only from things and those and these, all the obvious, but in the literal sense of the word, I run.  It started off as a whim; my friend and I said "Let's go for a run!"  because we were 20 and we knew that running was good for us.  Then it became a thing I just did.  (her, not so much.) I wouldn't call it a passion so much as it was a drive, and the mental challenge of knowing I had done it even though I knew it would hurt and even though I never felt like running before I had actually run was what kept me going. After a run, you are never sorry that you did it.  

Not ever. 

 Like, not even ever.  

And then you also have the endorphins flooding your brain, and the memory of that is often another factor that keeps you tying yourself into your shoes and out the door.  

     When you tell people you run, they usually ask you if you race, and if you tell them no, they ask you when you are going to start doing races.  I have done one race ever only, and it wasn't a very long race, but it was one of my slowest running times, and the whole thing hurt.  I do not love races.  I do not plan to do any more.  I run with the crowd in my own mind cheering me on.  I run and God goes with me, and we enjoy that.  He tells me things while I run.  I cannot explain that to you.

     My favorite way to run is uphill.

     You can't get a better workout than to run uphill.

     I have not tried all workouts, but go run up a hill, and you will know what I mean.  Regardless of the trends that come and go, running has always been a thing people do.

     My favorite runner in the bible was Elijah.  I find his story to be fascinating.  I especially love that part when after exhausting himself from a long run, he falls asleep under a bush and is soothed by an angel making him warm bread and telling him to sleep some more. (1 Kings 18:45-19:21)

 I just love that story.

     These past few years, I have been mainly running on a treadmill.  I like the fact that I am not subject to the outside terrain, or the weather, or the threat of mountain lions, rattlesnakes, or murderers hiding somewhere up ahead.  I like that I can run on the treadmill without pepper spray.  I like that I can keep the incline as high or as low as I choose, and it will stay there until I change it.

     I keep it all the way up. 

 My theory:  Why not make the most of my time on this machine by cranking the incline all the way up?  I used to hold on to the front of the treadmill as I ran uphill this way.  Awkward and completely not supported by nature to be running uphill yet holding onto something that is not moving up with you.  I could get a lot of miles in that way, though.

But over a month ago, I heard the Lord telling me to let go.

I have been learning to let go in other ways, and here He is coaching me to let go of the treadmill, too.  Now without holding on, I run for 10? 20? seconds at at a time, burst of speed, and then slow down to a fast walk, and then back up to running, then back, and on and on and all the while I am on the highest incline.

    Without holding on, I have to balance myself, my whole body gets into the focus of balancing, righting, correcting what would otherwise be so wrong.  

     I no longer count the miles because the miles no longer matter.  

     I don't pay attention to physical changes on my body because who cares.  I'm doing something good but the focus was never meant to be on me.  

I didn't always realize this; I used running as a form of creating glory for myself.  I did not even consciously think I was doing this, at the time.  But when you feel unloved in life, you will find a way to be noticed.  Notice me, I have worth and significance because I run.  You cannot buy these calves, I had to earn them.  It took years. And that was the motivation of the outdoor runner I used to be.  When I became an indoor runner, my method was not only to push myself as hard and as far as I could with the help of my own mental trainer, (She was a tough one, let me tell you.)  but I would look around the room and think, "make sure you are working harder than anyone else."  Promoting myself to the top, in my own mind.  

     I don't do that anymore.  

At least I sure hope I don't.

     It is dangerous to set up and start to decorate your own inner kingdom.  It becomes an addiction in which you worship yourself.  There can be no peace in that kingdom.  There can only be peace when you submit your desires and wishes for a workout into the authority of the Lord of Lords, who himself gives you the energy and the lungs and the ability with which to use them for the run.  Physical training is of some value.  Some!  But what is it doing for the spirit?  Is it helping or hindering?  Because I believe it can be doing either, depending on where your heart and mind are grounded and centered.  (Remember, I said that God speaks to me when I run?  I cannot explain that to you.) There are definite benefits and concepts you learn while enduring such a thing as a long run.  You learn endurance, to endure, and when you read about such a concept in the bible, it then makes *that much more sense* in the light of the physical feat you can relate to having endured. 

 When your trusted girlfriend encourages you in your mothering by saying, "it's a marathon, not a sprint," how can you truly understand that metaphor if you have never run in each of these ways?

*You understand the usefulness for pain.

*You understand that joy comes on the other side of the pain.

*You understand what it means to do a thing with excellence.

     I pray every day that the Lord will direct even my workout.  It turns out He is an even better personal trainer than the one in my head.  He is also much kinder.  He gives me ideas, and I go with them, and they end up being the most satisfying workouts I would never have thought of on my own. Or else I would have thought of them and then "thought better" of them. 

 Irony there.

 The arrogance there. 

 Prone to injury there.

  

 Our society is obsessed with bodies, with youth, with working out and food.  It tries to contain and control all that God gave us to have freedom and take delight in. The world tries to get you to be obsessed with your body, how you workout, how, when and what you eat, and the sciences change and shift all the time; "we used to think this or that was bad or good for you, now we know that this or that is actually good or bad for you."  It's a never ending treadmill that cannot end well because there is no peace there, just the ever meandering search that keeps you running in circles around your own ever diminishing understanding.  

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight." -Proverbs 3:5-6

(Even your running paths,

even your nutritional paths.

yes, even ALL of that.)

     I used to like to read fitness and health magazines.  I now see them and feel mainly sad. (Old Wives' Tales, anyone?  1 Timothy 4:7) Why is this woman posed like that, stretching out her naked abs with a smile for all the world to see?  Why do we have to read up on how she obtained them, what exercises in self denial and self restraint and self worship she adhered to so that we all could look upon her abs and bow down in worship and humiliation?  Yet I know she is standing like that and letting the cameras click their instant flash of blink-or-you'll-miss-it glory because that is all she has to live for.  That is all she has to be happy about in a day.  I flip through these magazines quickly now, if I ever do pick them up at the gym.  I flip through to see if there are any helpful tips or ideas I had not thought of; make up ideas I like and want to try, for example.  But never to enslave myself or to make myself feel "less than." This is a fun way to utilize the magazine, but this alone will never satisfy my soul.  That woman on the cover is probably soul starving even though she has had a perfectly proportioned workout, breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  

I no longer count the miles.

I no longer count the calories.

Ironically, I eat healthier than I have my entire life before this moment, and it is full of a balance of colors and healthy fats and more deliciousness than I have ever known.  My life is more delicious than ever before, and I run with God, and I eat until I am satisfied when The Lord Himself becomes my portion.

-XOXO,

(I also find that running uphill is easier on your joints, and I never suffer from things like shin splints and such.)

Fifteen Years A Mother (For Kristina)

(A poem about eternity, in the light of maternity)

The sky is blue

like the bluest eye of Heaven, the sun like it's pupil.

I am underneath with my little book of memories.

I can read it because there is light on and around me, 

the glory of an opened eye, giving sight to my opened eyes.

I pray I may see.

(So goes the prayer)

Let me sit at your feet as you read me a story.

I do not see time, nothing moves.

How do we get from this to that, morning to night to morning again, 

when we never see it moving?

I once held a baby who would always be a baby in the intensity of the moment of need meeting and limited sleep, unaware I was teaching her all she may never need.  Yet I did not close my eyes and she has grown as big as her Mama, and she is teaching me. 

And I thought the baby would never end.

And the more closely I watched her, the less I could see it happening. 

But I have mental snapshots; 

click, first smiles, click first giggles,

click first illness,

click 

click to reading and writing and instruments, and never eating meat or wearing anything I chose,

click to heart break, 

click to too smart for her own good, 

click to inklings of leadership sprinkled throughout every other memory.

click,

She at stages of ever widening grace.

Yet what remains: She has eyes as blue as the ever expanding eye of the sky, 

and I am here now being held in the heat of it's gaze,

the bluest eye of God.

The way french toast softens and expands

  I watch the bread get soft, expansive. All of the liquid protein, calcium, and vitamin D now hiding within the bread.

Mornings in this house, I am the first one awake, and the second one awake is my one year old son.  He and I have become very good at cooking delicious breakfasts together.  I hold him in one arm and cook with the other.  My right hand holds (in turns) the spatula, the fork,  and does (in turns) the mixing, flipping and covering.  My left hand holds (all at once) the fascination, curiosity, wonder, delight, and sometimes frustration of a 20+ pound boy.  

He loves to watch the cooking process.  

    All this week, I have been feeding my household French Toast.  Before this week, I have never fed them french toast, but they loved it the first day, so I keep right on making it and changing up the recipe. 

My Method:   First, soak the bread in a mixture of milk, cinnamon, and egg, one or two or three or more eggs depending on how many children you have and how much protein you are trying to sneak into them. I let the bread soak for at least 5 minutes so that it is really soft.  (Especially if you are using gluten free bread.) Then I put butter in the skillet and let it melt and spread.  Put the pre-soaked bread into a skillet.  Pour most of the liquid in which the bread was soaking on top of the bread in the pan. This next step is optional but very wonderful: I then cut banana wheels and cover the bread with them, and on top of that, I sprinkle a little brown sugar.  Cover with a lid and let cook on medium to medium low for 5-7 minutes-ish.  Flip over.  Flipping while keeping the bananas in place is a bit of a trick, You will have to put your one year old child down for this,  and he will not understand, but he will be comforted once you pick him up again and show him what you have just done. (Singing him a song also helps. Giving him a drink of milk while you flip also helps.)  Then cover the other side of the French Toast with a layer of banana wheels and a sprinkle of brown sugar.  Flip a few more times until it looks just golden tinged enough.  The whole thing will be expansive and soft, easily breaking apart with a fork.  

Serve with butter.  

It does not need syrup. 

   

The trick to French toast is just that it has to sit and soak the good stuff in.  It has to soften and expand. 

 (And I sit with the Lord, I spend time soaking up His word, I spend time in prayer, I spend time resting quietly at His feet.)  

And There is no way my one year old can understand this.  

(And there is no way my 38 and a half year old mind can comprehend what the eternal Lord of the universe is cooking, or how.) 

 One Year Old son sees the food about to be prepared and put together and wonders why he isn't already eating right this instant.  When I look at my one year old, I think to myself all of the loving that a mind can think. I think so many loving thoughts that my mind feels it may explode. I feel all of the mushy softness of my own heart and soul, mushy softness born of sitting and soaking in the Lord's goodness to me, where I could never have understood his thoughts, His ways, His timing and reasons,  and I know that no explanation will make sense of this to my one year old.  So I comfort him, I hold him, I sing to him, I SHOW him what I am doing.  He gets distracted and fascination takes over his regret.  And then again, he does not understand when the food has been cooked, but is still too hot for his mouth, so he has to wait another two minutes, tops? But then after that two minutes when he sits down to eat?  Pure pleasure, satisfaction, contentment.  He sits back in his high chair and asks for milk.  I gladly refill his cup.  He drinks delight, having forgotten his former frustrations, and   never even having the hindsight to understand why he had to experience frustration at all. He is happy and content with his full belly.

I think sometimes I am both the food my Lord is preparing, softening, soaking, filling with every good thing on this side, and also the child on his other hip, resting, waiting, watching, wondering, yet in no way comprehending.

My heart is a shell, and it has been cracked,

and crushed,

but out of shell oozed the useful stuff,

equal parts translucent and gold, for soaking in the Bread of Life.

What is the song He is singing to me, as I wait for my softening to be complete?

And if through this, I am made a meal to nourish someone else's starving soul, wouldn't all of the waiting, confusion, and discomfort have been worth it?

These words are easy to say.

They are not so easy to endure. 

We cannot know the things that the Lord is making of our lives, and we don't even always (ever?) know who we are being used to feed.

All I know is that the more I pray to be made into the person He wants me to be, to be used in the ways He wants to use me, the more I find myself in the kitchen, cooking newer, ever more creative meals for my family.

I don't think that is a coincidence. I  do think there is a lesson in that, which I am *maybe, barely, babyishly* beginning to grasp at the edges of meaning.

"But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you." -Philippians 2:17

-XOXO,