Reminder Bear

Greetings from Michigan.  It is so unbelievably lovely here right now.  Wherever I go I pass roadside produce stands brimming with bushel upon bushel of freshly picked apples.  I am snacking on them between every meal and spending most of my days with my family and friends as we share memories and simply enjoy the rare gift of face to face time together.  

I have been contemplating the idea of a top ten list for my life as it stands right now.  This list would be the top ten things I need to be reminded of often, not only because they are foundational and important, but because I often get distracted and forget them.  I decided it would be hilarious yet practical to record these top ten truths and put them in a teddy bear voice box.  That way anytime I feel lost I could hug my soft reminder bear and God could use it to give me direction.  

Also, since I hate the sound of my own voice so I decided that I'll have Morgan Freeman record my top ten list.  This will really add impact and authority to my reminder bear.  I am pretty sure that when I get to heaven God will sound just like Morgan Freeman anyway.

Top Ten List for Reminder Bear:

(Don't get caught up on the order as the bear will dole out these truths at random)

1) In the busy-ness and the mess, be still and know that I am God.  Yes today and yes for you.

2) Every part of life, the good and the bad, is a season.  Don't let the bad destroy you and don't forget to savor the good moments.

3) While you're out, swing by the store and buy milk, eggs, and bananas.  Because you're probably running low on all three.  Silly but true, and I bet when Morgan Freeman says it, it sounds so profound!

4) You aren't destined to become your mom.  You are own person and your family will follow a new course, through my (God's) faithfulness I will be glorified in your perseverance.  

5)  I (God) don't need another "them" but I absolutely need you to be the you I made you to be.

6)  Remember the order of your Calling.  You are my daughter, Kel's wife, your children's mom and a writer.  You aren't a chef, maid or professional Facebook-er so use your time accordingly.   

7)  When life gets too much for you, you should probably get in the bathtub and remember who you are and where you are going.  A glass of wine wouldn't hurt either.  

8)  Believe the best about other people, they are rarely being jerks on purpose, so often they just don't understand.  Be patient.

9)  You don't need to earn my (God's) love, you already have it, rest in this truth, and stop trying so hard.

10)  Stop right now and be thankful for five things, this is a healthy and healing discipline and you will never regret doing it.  

I think we could all use a reminder bear, or at least a chalkboard that we could go to when we in our human weakness forget.  These are the truths that I need for today, for the leg of my journey that I find myself in right now.  I am certain that my reminder bear needs will change as I grow, but for now I am loving this little list.  Now to tweet Morgan Freeman and ask him a small favor...


Your turn, share a few things that you would put on your reminder bear list.  

Thoughts after Dark.

Good evening from my patio, I feel like this is the nightcap version of Penny Thoughts since I pretty much always post in the mornings.  I'll paint you a picture of my moment so that you can feel like you're across the table from me.  It's all the way dark outside and the moon is on the other side of the house so you can't see it.  The stars are out and the oil rig just beyond our wooden fence is squeaky and annoying.  We are trying to tune it out.  There is a beautiful breeze blowing through the rose bushes and some used sidewalk chalk nubbins scattered beneath our feet.  There, now you feel like you're right here with me.  

I am sitting here with some wine and I decided to write after another attempt at getting into Anita Shreve's "Sea Glass" failed.  I usually like her stuff but this one is slow and it's not hooking my interest.  So I put it down, partly because I don't love it and partly because I feel like God has something bigger for me out here, something I need to hear or maybe smell.  No, not smell, I have sniffed several times and I can't smell anything significant.  

I have been scrambling for perspective this week and I still don't have a firm grasp on it.  I have been desperately wanting to be fine with my Mom's death but as the anniversary of it gets closer the events of last October get brighter and more vivid.  ALmost like it is here all over again.  I think about the unpleasant details a lot, the nuts and bolts of her death.  I wish I didn't, I wish that I could make this season pass unobserved but something about it demands action.  So I bought a plane ticket home today, and I will be leaving a week from tomorrow to navigate my way through this gray anniversary with my family and friends back home.  I want to be with those who knew my Mom directly.  It will be a comfort to go through this side by side.  

A few days ago I was finishing a kitchen rug project when I snipped the tip of my finger with my sharp fabric scissor.  It was the tiniest snip but it left a small hole on the top of my left pinkie.  If I look very close I can still see the scab, but for the most part it has already healed up.  Are you ever just astounded at the human body's ability to heal?  I didn't have to do anything about that cut.  I just went about life as usual and it scabbed over and mended, soon to be indistinguishable from the rest of my finger tips.

I really wish that emotional pain was that simple.  There is a lot of truth in the fact that time heals emotional wounds, it plays an unarguably important role.  However, if you have ever experienced pain, tragedy or loss.  If your life has ever suddenly been altered for the poorer, you will know that you have to move through the pain almost tangibly.  You have to do more than just allow time to pass.  You have to shed tears, talk through feelings, put up pictures and perhaps go to counseling.  Sifting through deep pain is some of the hardest work on the planet.  It is exhausting on every level.  However, I truly believe that if you don't grieve you can't heal fully.  You have to "do grief."   There is no easy band-aid, believe me I wish I could tell you that there is.  

So tonight finds me coming to the stark realization that I will have to find ways to continue healing over these next two weeks.  Two weeks from right now, almost exactly, will be the one year anniversary of my Mom's suicide.  I have to deal with that.  It will make me think through who I am as her daughter, as my children's mother, and as a woman dealing with life on this earth.  I will continue to reject the dangerous lie that I will share her exact path.  I will not.  I am my mother's daughter, but I am not my mother.  

I don't want to face this milestone, but the hard part is, if wholeness and freedom is my goal, then dealing with it is my only option.  Pray for me, and if you are facing something hard that you wish that you weren't facing, talk about it with your support people.  They love you and that love will be there for you as you deal with your junk.  Don't deal with your burdens alone, I'm not going to and neither should you.  Heavy things were made to be carried by a team.  

steak and storage containers

Writers, myself included, have a tendency to use storms as a word picture for dark and trying times.  Yesterday that was not the case for me because yesterday in my little town, for the first time in months the heavens opened up with the most glorious rainstorm of my life.  To say that the land around here is dry would be the understatement of the year.  To give you an understanding of just how dry it is:  our grass is dead, our pond is almost completely dry, no one has been able to grow a tomato in our county and the dirt is so dry that its cracking the water mains and leaving thirsty people without water.  The average rainfall for our town in July is around 8 inches, last month we got .5 inches.  I have never experienced a summer that has left me hotter or thirstier than this one.  

Yesterdays storm rolling into our backyard

Yesterday morning when the sun rose it came without scorching heat but grey clouds that rumbled in the distance.  As I watched the storm approach I opened all the shades covering the bay windows in our dining "nook" and the kids and I watched it all roll in.  As the drops blew against our windows I swear I felt quenched on a soul level.


My mind kept conjuring images of dry plants busting open with big beautiful flowers and of dry ground popping up blades of thick green grass.  As I stood there in my kitchen, coffee in hand, I realized that the quenching had been happening for the past little while, the much needed moisture soaking through me and causing seeds to sprout.


I have had experiences with a few friends lately that have reminded me of who I really am and ways in which I had forgotten to bloom.  


Last weekend we went to our friends Joley and Jason's for a cookout and before we had a chance to change her into her suit, my two year old got into the kiddie pool and then rolled in the dirt.  There was no salvaging her clothes and when it came time to wrestle her back into the house we had to opt to cross-dress her in some of their son's clothes.  When we went into his bedroom for boy clothes I noticed Joley's meticulously organized closets and I was simultaneously depressed and jealous.  They were lined with storage bins and drawers, which were both labeled and full of folded clothes.  I used to work at an organization store and in a past life would drool over a good shelving or filing system.  When I saw Joley's closets the dry seeds of my love for organization got watered.


Then earlier this week I visited my friend Sarah for our first play date/lunch at her house.  Her house is beyond gorgeous and she has the most amazing style which is sort of vintage meets shabby chic.  To top it off she made a phenomenal salad for lunch complete with roasted chicken, kalamatta olives, feta and homemade balsamic dressing.  She also introduced me to lemon water with a sprig of rosemary in it.  Sarah is an amazingly sweet person and she's also kinda fancy.  As I sipped my herbed water and admired her antique bird scones I was reminded that I used to like being kinda fancy too.  My evenings used to be cloth napkins and new recipes and I used to enjoy artisan cheeses and home decor magazines.  Somewhere along the way that part of me got so thirsty that it went dormant, but that afternoon on Sarah's couch those seeds got a little water too.  


So because of these two encounters with my friends, this week  was just a little different.  Yesterday I hauled out some plastic storage containers and organized my spice drawer as well as all my crafty stuff.  And tonight for dinner we will be enjoying seared steaks topped with mushrooms and rosemary butter and served beside vanilla bean whipped sweet potatoes and roasted corn on the cob.  I'm doing this because I am a little bit organized and a little bit fancy and when I let those parts of me bloom I am a whole lot happier.  

Please enjoy the bold and beautiful colors of my organized spice drawer.  It's okay to be a little jealous.

Along the way parts of us get dry and usually it takes interacting with someone who is blooming in an area we let shrivel to make us realize how thirsty we are for something.  So perhaps today you are thirsty for something small like organized drawers and herbed butter or maybe you are thirsting for something a much more important like God and connection.  Don't let another day go by where you choose to stay parched, turn the hose on your life and be the vividly stunning person God planted you to be.